Just two clients have pulled out of deals since the Leave vote, out of a total of nearly 600 live cases being handled by conveyancer The Partnership.
The firm, with offices in Guildford and London, said that concerns of an immediate and catastrophic downturn in the property market had been “massively overblown”.
It said widespread fall-throughs had simply not happened.
Meanwhile leading agents haart said that the number of buyers pulling out of deals rose 11% last weekend compared with the final weekend in June last year.
However, the firm said this was fewer than expected.
It reported 1,500 new applicants registering between Friday and Monday, the same level as the last weekend in June last year.
Call volumes into branches reduced 7%, but website traffic has not seen much of an impact: haart said the England vs Wales match created a bigger lull in the hit rate.
CEO Paul Smith said: “While it’s true we have seen some buyers pull out of transactions due to the uncertainty caused by the Brexit vote, the effects haven’t been as great as we anticipated and we expect this to be a small blip as people come to terms with the result and get their head around what a Brexit means for them.
“Less than a week after the decision, we’re starting to see the market settle and confidence returning after the Friday morning low.
“The result has had no impact on website traffic or applicant figures. In fact the outcome may be resulting in opportunist buyers taking advantage of the situation by snapping up bargains caused by the uncertainty.
“What has been positive is that valuations have actually increased as vendors look to get a professional opinion on the value of their home to understand what effect there has been.”
At The Partnership, managing director Peter Ambrose said: “In the run-up to the referendum we had witnessed a lot of buyers and sellers being extremely cautious.
“Indeed, like many of the 150 estate agents and mortgage brokers that we work with on a daily basis, we were keen to see the referendum out of the way.
“Obviously, there was a shock to the system and on Friday there was a lot of distraction as people discussed the impact.
“However, despite widespread reporting of doom and gloom, we have not seen this reflected in either buyer behaviour or from estate agents that we have spoken to over the past 48 hours.
“We are not surprised to see immediate stabilisation, because in reality, nothing has changed.”
He went on: “Our agents reported strong viewing numbers on the Saturday and this resulted in a significant number of offers being accepted and us giving quotes on Monday.
“We expected a large volume of our clients to withdraw from their purchases but it simply hasn’t happened.
“We are running a large caseload of about 600 cases, many of which are first-time buyers, and we have had only two cancellations due to the referendum in the last three days which is actually less than usual.
“In the last 24 hours we have spoken with over 50 estate agents, who all back up our experience. Naturally people are concerned, but this is simply not resulting in deals falling apart.
“Where people have a genuine need to move, then deals are progressing as normal.”
While haart is the first agent to put any numbers on what happened in the last six days, disappointed home movers have reported failed sales on Twitter.
We are unlikely to get hard facts but my guess is that a high proportion of the Brexit-inspired fall throughs highlighted on social media involve buyers and sellers going it along by using cut price online agents. No-one to hold their hands and talk them through the wobble.
As for haarts ‘11% increase’ in fallthroughs – it is a meaningless statistic without knowing the base number. I’d be more inclined to believe that actuality is close to what Peter Ambrose is saying.
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Speaking to a couple of other trusted solicitors in Surrey the numbers of abortive sales on Friday and Monday was somewhat heftier. We lost two, which in a low volume marketplace a bit of a pain to put it mildly. The world still turns and people still have to live somewhere.
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Too early to call many buyers will be sitting on their hands rather than pulling out .You can bet your life agents are fielding calls with buyers taking advantage of the current situation trying to to chip the price.Pehaps a better question to ask is How many sellers have capitulated to demands from buyers to renegotaite the price since Brexit and accepted it and by how much?
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This really is NOT the Armageddon we expected with just two of our sales falling through (one replaced already) and rather more sales being confirmed/agreed since Friday.
This weekend’s open houses are well booked up with a full price offer on one, even before we get there. This really may not be as bad as we are all expecting but it is very clear that the buyers and sellers need their hands firmly held with expert guidance- not something a call-centre agent is able to achieve! This change with more emphasis on knowledge and understanding could well be just the thing the market needs to wave goodbye to them. 🙂
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Let’s have a vote on where houses prices will be in 12 months time.I can say quite confidently lower.
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Prices were heading down anyway and my own view was that they would be up to 5% down by next April (Home Counties). Brexit is now being blamed for this, which is a red herring.
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