© Evening Times
Originally published: 16.02.2009

One of Scotland's leading property consultants has predicted a recovery of house prices by the end of the year after reporting a surge of interest from buyers in January.

Rettie & Co, with offices in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Melrose, said the fall in house prices appeared to be bottoming out.

It reported a 68% increase in the number of new buyers registering, and a rise of 62% in the number of viewings.

Simon Rettie, the company's managing director, said that while it was too soon to tell how much of this interest would translate into sales, it showed that a level of confidence was returning to the housing market.

Describing the economic situation as "grim", Mr Rettie said there had been "small, but significant, signs of some healing" in the property sector.

While Rettie's business has a stronger presence in Edinburgh, where it focuses on the higher end of the market, the firm saw sales in Glasgow double in January.

Reports of an upsurge of interest from buyers have been confirmed by estate agents in the west of Scotland.

And after months of virtual stagnation in the mortgage market, there were claims that buyers are finding it easier to obtain loans from banks and building societies than in the last months of 2008.

Rettie claimed that landlords were seeing rental prices increasing as people avoided buying properties, and that the weak pound had lured ex-pats back to Scotland - all of which was slowing the downwards trajectory of house prices.

However, Mr Rettie warned that the government still had to do more to make sure buyers were able to obtain finance, and called on ministers to repeal stamp duty for two years and underwrite mortgages for first-time buyers of properties valued at up to £250,000.