Property expert says agents have learned their lesson...

Property expert and housing analyst Kate Faulkner says estate agents have 'learned their lesson' from the property market slump in 2007-2008.

In an article on her website, Faulkner references haart's call for sellers to price their homes more realistically to cope with a drop in demand since April.

Faulkner suggests that if haart is right - which she believes it is - owners and investors could be left with some big problems.

She says that many properties are still selling for less than they were before the financial crisis.

"If prices start to slow now we will, for the first time ever in the UK, have experienced our first true property price bubble," she writes.

Faulkner predicts that in many locations across the country, properties will not sell for the price they were previously purchased for unless there is a market boom in the area.

"Regional data shows that five out of our nine regions in the UK are still experiencing property prices lower than they were eight years ago.”

“At current growth rates, the North and Yorkshire and Humber are unlikely to recover for up to three years, whereas the Midlands may well recover in the next year or so."

Last week director of estate agency haart, Paul Smith, said ‘the nation has neared the limit in terms of price rises’, while the National Association of Estate Agents reported that demand for homes hit a two-year low in April.

You can read Kate Faulkner's article in full here.