End of the housing boom?

Peter Henley Politics Editor, BBC South

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The bigger they come, the harder they fall. And in the South of England there certainly are some very big prices in the estate agents windows. So big, many believe, they are going to go down with a bang.

At housepricecrash.co.uk they are replaying a video from the 80s comedy show "Spitting Image".

In a pastiche of the Madness song they sing: "Our House...in the middle of a slump, Our House.. no-one wants to buy this dump."

In a time of buy-to-let fortunes and starter mortgages 10 times income, it feels strange to think back to those long stagnant years.

Surely there is a desperate shortage of housing in the South-East?

How could prices fall?

Well many believe they are already on the way down, with Estate Agents in hotspots like Reading and Winchester reporting the proportion of viewings to sales changing dramatically in October 2007.

Crisis effect

Continuing high interest rates and the crisis at Northern Rock seems to have got people rattled.

In Brighton, one homeless shelter is reporting people coming to them for assistance in greater numbers, and from a different background.

They have not seen these problems since the 1980s, when Spitting Image was singing about Mrs Thatcher.

So much, then as now, seems to be a question of confidence.

And politically, it feels like confidence in Gordon Brown is slipping away by the hour.

Is there a crash on the way?

Should the government be pressing ahead with house building in the South?

Send us your thoughts, And join us on the Politics Show on Sunday 25 November 2007 at 12:00 GMT on BBC One

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