Evidence from building society Nationwide, whose figures are regarded as mostly reliable, suggests they might be.
Its figures show that house prices fell just 0.4 per cent in November compared to a panic-inducing 1.3 per cent in November, bringing the annual rate of decrease from to 13.9 per cent from 14.6 per cent.
Prices may take another tumble in December and January as these are traditionally the two weakest months for house sales and anyone needing to sell will have to slash the price.
There have been reports this week that homes in posh London areas like Chelsea and Kensington are being cut by hundreds of thousands of pounds from the clearly unsustainable levels of just a few months ago. City executives losing their jobs will take a further chunk out of this market.
The other most troubled area is the (equally unsustainable) recent boom in new build flats for singletons, which was fuelled by the ‘buy to let’ market, now largely disappeared.
Developers are now trying to flog these off to people who actually want to live in them and finding that there are no first time buyers any more.
But mortgage rates are coming down, albeit slowly, as the Bank of England reduces bank rate. What the housing market really needs is another dramatic cut from the bank, taking the rate down to 1.5 per cent from its current three per cent which would make it pretty clear that rates don’t have much further to fall.
Then buyers might go for fixed deals based on this rate (but not two per cent alas) rather than waiting for them to reduce over the next few months.
So is a recovery on the cards for the spring?
Mr Blatherskite thinks there might be although he’s been accused of being a cock-eyed optimist for thinking so.