The slow down in the housing market has been very obvious round this part of the world for some time now. New developments which would have been snapped up off plan as soon as they were on the market 3 to 4 years ago, carry FOR SALE boards for months now
When I first moved back up north I was surprised to find that private renting was still a fairly significant form of tenure for ordinary families. Nothing to do with the more recent Buy-to-let boom, just the old majority form of tenure clinging on where many people simply could not afford to buy & council housing is relatively scarce.
Private renting declined quite sharply in the 90s & early 2000s, though frankly it worried me, to see so many people having to take on mortgages for 6-figure sums
TO Let signs have been much more in evidence recently, even on the new developments. A new phenomenon however is FOR SALE OR TO LET. Some of these may well be Buy-to-let landlords trying to get out, but some have definitely been occupied for some years by the family that owned them. This suggests buyers have become extremely difficult to find
