Mortgage lending fell for the first time in four months in March, according to the latest British Bankers Association figures. The number of mortgages approved went from 28,024 in February, to 26,097 in March - a drop of around 7% without too much calculation, and 25.3% lower than March last year.

The total amount of money approved for new home mortgages fell from £3.5billion in February to £3.3billion in March, making it 39.3% less than the amount approved in March 2008.

With mortgage lending at such low levels property prices will continue to fall. Even the three consecutive monthly growths beforehand barely lifted us off the mortgage lending floor.

According to the Rightmove House Price Index, around 19,000 new homes were coming onto the market every week in March, this grew to 22,000 new homes per week in April, which was viewed as a positive sign of confidence returning to the market.

But this means that around 76,000 new houses came onto the market in March, when only 26,097 mortgages were approved. Even factoring in the high volume of cash-transactions currently at play, this would leave thousands of homes unsold -- cash-transactions are primarily on auction properties, not those sold through the likes of Rightmove.

88,000 new houses then came onto the market in April, which, failing some massive spike in mortgage lending will have left thousands more houses unsold.

This on top of those thousands of unsold homes accrued throughout the previous months of astonishingly low mortgage lending and we are adding up to a serious problem: supply is increasing faster than sales are, and the banks tight lending policies are undoubtedly playing a part in this.

With that in mind it is little wonder that people are cutting out all the middle-men and swapping houses, in much the same way as cars have been bought and sold for many years, only more official and safe: both homes are independently valued, and the owner of the lower valued home must pay the difference.

The Zungalow property community is the perfect platform for this kind of activity, because property advertising packages start from just £29 per year. Homeowners advertise to sell their home privately, and then interested parties may strike up the conversation about buying or swapping. Thus potential sellers are able to keep their options open.

The Chancellor's budget revealed yesterday contained several very promising measures aimed at stalling the UK house price freefall and kick-starting recovery. But the truth is that the housing market cannot recover without a wider economic recovery; sufficient numbers aren't considering buying a home while millions are unemployed and millions more in fear of their jobs.

So the question property professionals should be asking today is not so much: will Darling's measures aimed at the housing industry work? But rather: will Darling's budget bring a swift recovery to the wider economy so that his housing measures may have their full effect.

For instance: Darling extended the funding for the shared equity HomeBuy Direct scheme by £80m. Under this scheme the government can loan up to 30% of a home's value to first time buyers or other eligible parties, which can be used as a deposit in order to get a good mortgage deal. But unless the employment situation improves the additional funding will hardly be needed.

It is therefore hoped that Darling's economic spending such as: the £750m Strategic Investment Fund to help emerging technologies and regionally important sectors, will work in conjunction with the £250m to help people get work experience in growth industries, to create new jobs, which the £1.7bn of additional funding for the Job Centre Network will ensure are quickly and efficiently filled.

Darling also announced government backing for mortgages, and £500m to kick-start stalled developments, which will increase housing supply as well as saving and providing construction jobs.

If (dare I say when) it all comes together, increasing and secure employment will mean more people looking to buy homes, government securities will mean mortgages are more available when they do, and the HomeBuy and other shared equity schemes will solve the problems with raising a deposit for those in newly secure employment, and the £500m will have ensured there are plenty of homes for them to buy.

However, by Darling's admission 2009 is going to be a rough year for the UK economy, worse than any year since the great depression of the 1930's, so none of those things are going to happen until, at best early 2010, more likely mid 2010. That said: for 2009 it is a case of battening down the hatches and weathering the storm; it may well get worse before it gets better.

With UK house prices continuing to fall many people have been sitting on their hands rather than sell in such turbulent conditions.

That could all be about to change; there is currently a lot of optimism surrounding the latest release of Rightmove's house price index, which reported the 3rd consecutive monthly rise in asking prices. This could result in many people thinking the time is right to put their house onto the market, which could be greatly detrimental to UK house prices.

Rightmove recording a rise in asking prices is not a good sign. All other reputable indexes are showing prices still falling, there has been no massive increase in transaction numbers, and all signs point to prices continuing to fall. Therefore raised asking prices only affirm the recent reports that vendors are still unwilling to be realistic and drop their prices in order to sell.

This is bad news for UK house prices because it threatens to prolong the current freefall for those vendors who are realistic. Until eventually the majority of vendors are forced into realism by the market's bottom, indicated by hugely increased transaction and buyer numbers.

Anyone who wants to sell their property, but isn't quite yet ready to drop their price the 20-30% necessary to sell by traditional means, is advised to try unconventional means such as Zungalow.com. Richard McKay Zungalow director said sellers have "nothing to lose," from advertising on their site.

"Many people right now are thinking: how can I sell my house right now, I won't even get enough to pay off my mortgage? But that needn't be the case. Our £29 per year package is the perfect suck-em-an-see package for UK private home sales, you can show your house to a massive community of online property browsers, all of whom are free to make offers on your property, be they for a swap, or higher than the going rate," Richard explained.

When the financial crisis crossed the Atlantic and Britain began to feel the effects, which were quickly felt in the housing market, nowhere felt it quicker than London. With that in mind, there is weight to the claims that the London market will also be the first to show signs of recovery.

If you take some reports at face value then that recovery is not so very far away, in London at least.

In a press release issued today, but containing quotations collated last week, Kinleigh, Folkard and Hayward staff are extremely optimistic about the London housing market.

"In Muswell Hill, things tend to dip over Easter as families drift away for the school holidays, but I think that after the break, we will again see people making a definite bid to move over the summer, in preparation for the new school year," said Andrew Hunt sales manager at KLF's Muswell Hill Branch.

Hunt also said that several Muswell Hill properties had received above asking price offers in the past month, and that there had been an increase in the number of properties receiving multiple bids.

KLF's Streatham Branch are also receiving multiple offers on properties, and their sales manager James Brooks has said that prices are no longer falling in the borough.

"Following on from a good February, we are seeing multiple offers being made on properties and a high level of buyers registering with us. Prices are remaining competitive, but are certainly not falling in Streatham," he said, adding:

"Easter normally marks the start of the busiest period in the housing market and we are expecting good activity. Mortgage rates are coming down and this is attracting buyers who are looking to make offers."

Fellow KLF sales manager Mai Pexton told a similarly positive story of optimism for the Marylebone borough and the buoyancy of the Central London market.

"The current climate offers some vendors the opportunity to go to sealed bids and we have seen properties with three or more potential buyers bidding, which provides a very exciting situation for our clients," she said.

The Forest Hill Branch also noted over asking price offers, and "far greater activity in the market." And the Earlsfield Branch sales manager was also positive about greater buyer confidence in the market, and offers getting closer to asking price.

In fact the one exception to the completely positive tone of the release was from the Kennington branch.

"Looking forward, I think the new HIP regulation will affect instruction levels in April. Speculative vendors are being put off by the potential delays in marketing, but I expect this to be short term and in my experience the motivated sellers are still very much committed to moving," said Kennington sales manager Justin Bhoday.

It will be interesting to see whether the KLF's optimism for the month of April was realised, and whether transaction levels begin to return to somewhere close to normal levels.

As selling property privately becomes an extremely popular way of selling homes, a new company is launched that could revolutionise the way people sell houses in the UK.

Zungalow.com allows people to advertise their property whether they would like to sell it, are curious to see if anyone would buy it, or simply to show off the interior design on show within the house. All this is possible because a standard package with Zungalow.com is free.

"The free package is limited by comparison to our paid silver and gold packages, but it is perfect for anyone who is curious what kind of interest there would be in their home, before committing on whether or not they are actually going to sell," said Zungalow director Richard McKay.

The standard package allows users to add one property with up to 5 images, and a "system generated" short description.

"Our silver and gold packages allow much better presentation of properties, including video walk-through and much larger descriptions written by the owner (or seller). We therefore recommend these packages to anyone committed to selling their property(ies)," continued Richard.

Zungalow's silver package allows users to add up to 3 properties with up to 10 images, a video walk-through, and written description of up to 1000 characters for £29 per annum.

The Gold package allows 20 properties, each with up to 15 images and a 1500 word description, as well as a video walk-through, for&pound149 per annum.

Though the larger packages can be used by agents, Richard was keen to point out that Zungalow is most definitely focussed on becoming a community based portal for people selling property privately.

"The larger packages are mainly to allow people to show their property off more. Though we won't turn agents away, we hope that Zungalow will become a social community for UK homeowners, and that the community atmosphere will make it a comfortable environment for buying and selling property privately," he said.

About Zungalow

Zungalow is a property community for the UK where members can create their own property profiles using text, photos and video content. Unlike other traditional property websites, there is no obligation to buy, sell or rent to be part of the Zungalow community.

To find out more contact Liam Bailey liam@write-about-property.com