2014 – A general overview on the Dutch housing market then and now
At this point of the market I don’t need to point out to you that in the past
years it has been very difficult to sell your home for a price that won’t kill you
financially. The Dutch housing market was like a pressure cooker out of control.
Housing prices dropped dramatically, mortgage interest has increased and then
there are still a lot of dreadful situations. In the Dutch society there are people
who can’t pay their mortgages anymore for whatever reason and therefore loose
their properties.
If your home has a bigger mortgage than value, you certainly need the written
permission of your bank to sell the property and come to an agreement to settle
the balance afterwards. Unfortunately, this was in many cases what had to be
done. Then there is the other category of people – usually above the age of 40
years who have bought already long time ago a property or even inherited one
and who have a profit when selling.
Generally spoken, there are two categories of people wanting to buy a new
home. The first are the so-called “new comers” – the starters, who are in a great
position. They have nothing to sell in this market. They can go directly to a bank
and determine how much money they can receive as a mortgage. As starter you
should notify that this is the market to buy. When you are buying for the first
time I can highly recommend you to be advised.
The second category are the people who need to sell their home before they can
afford to buy a new one.
For now I would like to dedicate some attention to the housing prices. Usually
the main question that rises is in which direction will the housing prices go in
2014?
There are many factors playing a major role in this. Lot of decisions are coming
from the European Central Bank. If they are deciding that it will be more
expensive for our banks to lend money, then it will affect our savings interest.
For the moment it is low and it will be kept low for the time being. But once our
economy is going to get better, also this will change. However, the recovery of
our economy is still very fragile!
As a real estate agent I predict the prospect on 2014 are positive. One of the
reasons is that there is a significant growth of starters wanting to buy their first
home.
