zillow.com Releases Homeowner Confidence Survey

After celebrating its third birthday this week, US property valuation and portal zillow.com has released its fourth quarter Homeowner Confidence Survey, and the results are interestingly optimistic.

Writing on the company’s blog, Amy Bohutinsky, zillow.com’s VP, Communications, said that two and a half years after house prices peaked, homeowners are finally realising that their property is worth less. However, they don’t appear to believe that this downward trend will continue.

76 percent of US homes lost value in 2008, according to analysis of Zillow’s Q4 Real Estate Market Reports. However, just 57 percent of homeowners think their home’s value has decreased over the last year according to the homeowner confidence survey. In fact, 18 percent think their home’s value has stayed the same and 25 percent think their home’s value has increased.

70 percent of homeowners predict their home’s value will either increase or stay the same in the first six months of 2009 – meaning homeowners have decided the market has already reached rock bottom. As Amy points out, this is something most economists are not willing to do – so is it pure optimism or delusion on the part of the homeowners?

zillow.com say that it is a perplexing window into the psyche of the American homeowner:

“At a time when depressing economic news is everywhere we turn, maybe it’s a sentiment that “it can’t get any worse,” or “we can’t fall any further.” Certainly for a generation that has yet to live through a prolonged recession, the idea that home values may continue to fall, or may not improve significantly for years to come, is unfathomable.”

This positive spirit of consumer optimism was also reflected across the Atlantic in UK property portal rightmove.co.uk’s consumer confidence survey this month. According to rightmove.co.uk, two thirds believe it’s a buyer’s market and almost half of all respondents plan to buy in the next 12 months, despite 7 in 10 predicting further price falls over the course of 2009. But they predict the misery will be short lived, as only 1 in 4 expect the start of 2010 to be a worse time to sell a property.

Agents and portals alike will be hoping the confidence of consumers in the market picking up is not misplaced, and translates into genuine confidence in the market.

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