Having adequate equity to remortgage for the best interest rate is slipping.  House prices have been falling and with it the built equity in properties.  The latest information from house price indexes showed another fall in house prices for the 15^th straight month.  For those few that indicated there was a slight gain on house prices the upward movement was marginal. 

The drop in house prices is not expected to reverse any time soon.  In the latest survey from Hometrack, the data shows that the number of buyers is falling and this is the second month in a row.  There was an increase in the number of homes coming on the market for sale which pushed the gap between demand and supply further apart. 

The only area where home sellers and homeowners are not experiencing the pains of a fallen economy is in the London area.  There the sellers are finding buyers willing to pay asking prices or close to it and homeowners are seeing their home values increase.  Data showed that a home has to be on the market for approximately six weeks before selling in London while it takes almost double that time averaging 11 weeks in the North.

Richard Donnell, director of research at Hometrack, said "Events in the Eurozone, together with pressures on the domestic economy and household incomes, are clearly taking their toll on consumer confidence.  This will compound the gap between supply and demand and suggests a likely acceleration in the level of monthly price falls over the final quarter of the year."

"The wider the gap between asking and achieved, the less slack there is to absorb weaker demand.  In the short-term we see above average price falls registering in the housing markets in the north of the country."