Fewer sellers having to discount their asking prices, says Zoopla

The number of properties that have had their asking prices reduced has fallen, although four in ten sellers in the North are still having to chop values.

Property website Zoopla said the proportion has fallen from 37% to 32% over the last year.

The portal also says the amount of the discount offered from the original asking price has also fallen: the average cut in asking price was 7.6% last August and is 6.3% now.

The highest proportion of discounted properties is in the North where, for example, 42.7% of properties currently for sale in Barnsley have had their asking price reduced at least once since being put on the market, with Rotherham (42.3%) and Wakefield (42.1%) not far behind. 
 
London continues to have the lowest proportion of discounted properties on the market with less than a quarter (22.8%) of properties for sale in the capital today having had their asking price reduced.

Edinburgh (27.7%) has the second lowest proportion of price-reduced properties on the market currently, followed by Wolverhampton (29%).

Poole has the biggest average discount in the UK today, at 9.9%, followed by Liverpool, Doncaster, Barnsley and Bolton.