HOME BUYERS BRUSH OFF RATES RISES - A survey released this morning has indicated that people remain relatively confident about the long-term prospects for the Irish property market despite recent worries.
Carried out by the Bank of Ireland, the First-Time Buyer and Trading Up survey reports that most homeowners are still prepared to trade up to a more expensive property despite increases in interest rates.
Some of the reasons people gave as to why they decided to buy a home would seem to bear out what has been going on over the past few years. 25% said they decided to buy simply because they wanted to get on the property ladder, and only 10% because they wanted somewhere to live.
It also finds that people are not overly concerned about short-term movements in the value of their home.
Joe Larkin, director of personal lending at Bank of Ireland, said there was very high home ownership ratio of around 80% in Ireland. He said people were acutely aware of what was going on in the property market, in terms of interest rates and house prices, but were looking beyond these towards their 'dream home'.
Mr Larkin said he expected a stronger property in the second half of the year as he believed interest rates had now reached a peak.
***
US MORTGAGE RISK 'BIGGER THAN TERRORISM' - The risk of massive defaults on sub-prime mortgages and heavy debts now pose a bigger threat to US economic prosperity than terrorism, according to a panel of US business economists.
The National Association for Business Economics said the home loans crisis had supplanted terrorism and the Middle East as the biggest short-term threat to the US economy.
Over 250 of the economists were surveyed with 18% saying the sub-prime situation was their biggest concern at present.
***
MARKETS AWAIT CENTRAL BANKS' VIEWS - Traders will be hoping for another relatively stable week on the markets after something of a recovery last week.
Trading in Asia was calm this morning with the Nikkei up slightly.
It's thought that most traders are waiting for European Central Bank President Jean Claude Trichet and the Fed chief Ben Bernanke to break cover on the crisis.
Mr Trichet is due to offer some assessment of the problems later today while Bernanke is scheduled to speak on Friday.
Markets have been in more robust shape since surprisingly strong US housing and sales numbers were released last week.
The euro is trading at $1.36 and 67.8p.
