House sales London up 17.5% on last October

Whilst the nation's media reports spell doom and gloom for the property market, London's market is going guns.

London is benefiting from having its own number of micro-markets. According to Agency Express (claiming to be the UK’s largest “For Sale” board management contractor) Greater London saw a 17.5% rise in house sales from October 2009 to October 2010.

Rightmove property portal report for London property sales: 

• The capital's sales are up from this time last year
• Some boroughs of London saw a massive 7.7% increase in sales in the past month alone.
• All London boroughs saw a positive monthly change in house sales between September and October.

One explanation for London's strong performance could be the approval by the FSA of a new homeowner mortgage lender entering the market. Precise Mortgages in the first non-bank lender to offer mortgages to homeowners since the beginning of the recession. Intending to offer credit to those people who have been refused by high street banks, Precise Mortgages is placing new confidence in the private property market and introducing a significant amount of new credit.

"There are a lot of creditworthy borrowers that the big five banks are not lending to. We hope that we can help fill that hole by increasing the supply of lending in the market," said Alan Cleary, Precise Mortgages managing director.