GOOD NEWS ON HOUSE PRICES: "Help to Buy: demand may outstrip supply as lenders brace for stampede"

Link to The Guardian

"More than 600,000 homes on the market are eligible for inclusion in the £12bn second phase of the Help to Buy scheme, according to the latest in a series of surveys leading to predictions that lenders will be flooded by pent-up demand for the government-backed mortgages.

"Details of the 95% mortgages, which are available to existing homeowners as well as first-time buyers, are to be unveiled by the chancellor, with some banks expected to invite loan applications within hours of the Tuesday announcement. The second phase of the flagship scheme to give more first-time buyers and others wider access to the housing market was brought forward by three months, with a report from high street bank Santander claiming that up to 1.7 million people are planning to use the scheme."

"... Many experts have argued that the government should ditch the second phase of Help to Buy, because they fear it will artificially inflate house prices too much by ramping up demand at a faster rate than the supply of homes coming on the UK market."