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Thousands of UK estate agents to lose jobs
Almost 15,000 real estate agents in Britain will lose their jobs over the next two years as a result of the global credit crunch, a think-tank said on Friday.
- Reuters
- Published: 21:10 June 6, 2008
London: Almost 15,000 real estate agents in Britain will lose their jobs over the next two years as a result of the global credit crunch, a think-tank said on Friday.
Estate agents were part of an estimated 40,000 people working in Britain's business services sector, including accountants and consultants, who are predicted to lose their jobs, the Centre for Economics and Business Research found.
The think-tank said the loss of estate agents was equivalent of the sector losing about five percent of its workforce.
Predicting the sector will have a "tough couple of years", the CEBR said that, for the first time in more than seven years, it would experience a decrease in total employment.
Experts said also under threat as result of the faltering local economy were conveyancing lawyers and architects.
The prediction came in a week when data from the Halifax, Britain's biggest mortgage lender, showed British house prices overall fell a larger-than-expected 2.4 percent in May.
One of the study's authors, Jorg Radeke, said in a statement the real estate industry was "likely to find the next 12 months particularly tough and there will be extensive job cuts".
Managing CEBR economist, John Ward, said the slowdown had been led by the housing and financial sectors, "so estate agents and architects will be among the first to suffer".
"As the impact of the consumer and housing slowdown trickles through the economy and affects all aspects of business to business spend, it will only be a matter of time before virtually all parts of the business services sector suffer," he said in a statement.
The gloomy news came as derivatives data showed that Britain's housing downturn is unlikely to bottom out until 2011 by which time average prices will have fallen by around 30 percent from their peak last August.
The Tradition Future HPI, which is based on the non-seasonally adjusted version of the Halifax price index, sees average British house prices bottoming out below 143,000 pounds in 2011 from 186,482 pounds currently.
According to derivatives market data, British house prices are likely to shed another 20 percent in the next 24 months.
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