It is 'naive' to increase property prices

Posted: 25 Mar 2009 13:17:13 GMT

Increasing the price of a property is an unwise move during the ongoing period of financial instability.

That is according to Firstrung, which has asserted that homeowners may damage their chances of actually selling their property if they price it too highly while the UK is in a recession.

Chief executive Paul Holmes said that sellers who choose to push up the price of their home are being "incredibly naive".

Mr Holmes made his comments on the back of figures from Rightmove which showed that the average asking price for a property increased by almost one per cent in March this year.

He said: "There is a difference between what houses are selling for and what house prices currently are.

"What we should be paying attention to is the bottom line; what houses and flats are actually selling for and not what they are priced at."

The March 2009 Rightmove House Price Index showed that £218,081 was the average asking price this month, an increase of 0.9 per cent compared to February.

However, this figure was actually down nine per cent compared to March 2008.

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