THE north's housing market continued to top a range of UK indicators in June amid a growing demand for people to buy their own home.
The latest Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics) and Ulster Bank residential market survey found that prices, enquiries, instructions, and sales indicators in Northern Ireland were all higher than the UK average last month, with new buyer enquiries and newly-agreed sales top of all UK regions.
But surveyors warn of a cooling off, with activity likely to moderate over the next three months (just 13 per cent expect sales activity to increase between June and August compared to 70 per cent in May).
And price expectations, whilst still strong, should ease too, with just 60 per cent of respondents anticipating prices will rise over the next quarter compared 75 per cent who shared the same opinion in April.
The number of properties being listed for sale also increased in the past month, with 41 per cent of Northern Ireland respondents - the highest figure since last August - reporting more new instructions to sell.
“That should help ease supply issues, which in turn will support sales activity and help ease price pressures,” according to Rics' regional residential property spokesman Samuel Dickey.
Terry Robb at Ulster Bank, added: “Given such strong demand to own or move, we're working to support people with their home-buying aspirations, and introducing NatWest’s mortgage offerings for customers here, which will include products such as 95 per cent mortgages in support of first-time buyers.”
