LONDON, April 12, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --

Three out of five (59%) homeowners in the UK expect house prices to rise over the next six months, according to the latest Zoopla.co.uk Housing Market Sentiment Survey. Confidence in the market outlook has strengthened from its record low at the end of last year when only 54% of homeowners expected prices to rise, but remains some way below the levels seen one year ago when four out of five (81%) expected prices to climb.

Homeowners are also more optimistic about the amount they expect the price of homes for sale to rise in the coming months. According to 7,984 homeowners surveyed by Zoopla.co.uk, house prices are expected to rise by an average of 2.8% over the next six months, noticeably up from the 1.9% predicted three months ago. The number of respondents who expect values to drop over the next 6 months has fallen to 1 in 4 (25%, down from 1 in 3 (33%) in December.

And, in typical British fashion, homeowners remain more confident about the prospects of the value of their own home compared to those of their neighbours. On average, homeowners predict the value of their own properties to grow by 3.2% over the next six months while they expect overall prices for property in their area to rise by only 2.8%.

Improved confidence in the future of the property market combined with the arrival of spring has resulted in a rise in the number of homeowners planning to conduct home improvements over the next six months to 40% of all households. And contributing to the increased confidence in the property market is the feeling that lending conditions are improving, with 12% of respondents stating that mortgage availability is better now than 3 months ago.

The greatest improvement in confidence over the last 3 months has been in Northern Ireland where 57% of homeowners now expect house prices to rise over the next six months, up from only 42% three months ago. In England 59% of owners expect house prices to rise up from 55% three months ago and in Wales 54% expect prices to climb, up from 49% three months ago. In Scotland confidence remains unchanged from December when 63% of those surveyed expected house prices to rise over the next six months.

Nicholas Leeming of Zoopla.co.uk, commented: "After almost 9 months of falling confidence and falling house prices, it looks like the property market is now starting to turn a corner. Falling prices have created attractive buying opportunities and with continued low inventory of property on the market, homeowners are increasingly expecting prices to rise in their local area. We still remain somewhat short of the confidence levels seen in early 2010 but there has been a clear improvement over the previous quarter and this is welcome news."

Methodology

• Zoopla.co.uk invited registered users to participate in this survey which was fielded from 21st to 28th March 2011.
• There were 9,231 total respondents. 7,984 of these were homeowners. Statistics based on a sample of this size are accurate to within +/- 1.0% with 95% confidence, if the sample is drawn at random from the population it intends to represent
• These respondents represent the perspective of the Zoopla.co.uk user community and could be considered to represent the population of people interested in the UK residential property market. All statistics are based on the full sample unless otherwise noted

About Zoopla.co.uk

Zoopla.co.uk is the UK's most comprehensive property website, focused on empowering consumers with the resources they need to make better-informed property decisions. We help our users make sense of the residential property market by combining property listings with market value data, local information and community tools.

Zoopla.co.uk was founded on the principles of transparency and efficiency and everything we do aims to make the market more effective for both property consumers and professionals alike. Our mission is to provide the most useful online property experience by:

• displaying property listings along with value and price trend information
• providing rich property data and local market information in one place
• enabling users to search for property in a variety of customised ways
• allowing users to engage with professionals via our tools like AskMe!
• building relationships between home owners and local estate agents

By combining free, instant value estimates for every UK home with sold prices, local market information and hundreds of thousands of properties available for sale and to rent, Zoopla.co.uk has become the ultimate destination for property consumers to search for property and do their market research. We are the UK's fastest growing property website and are proud to have been named 'Best Property Portal 2009' (Daily Mail UK Property Awards).

Our unique features, like AskMe!™ and TemptMe!™ allow users to gain an insight into the market and discover information they won't find anywhere else. And our AskAnAgent feature has rapidly become one of the most valued sources of vendor leads for UK estate agents. We calculate our value estimates using a proprietary algorithm (secret formula) that continuously analyses millions of data points relating to property sales and home characteristics throughout the UK. Our estimates are constantly refined, using the most recent data available and a variety of methodologies, in order to provide the most current information on any home.

Zoopla Ltd is a privately held company with a highly experienced and proven management team, backed by well-respected angel investors and leading venture capital firms Atlas Venture and Octopus Ventures.

SOURCE Zoopla.co.uk