Nobody knows whether yesterday's base-rate reduction and the emergency rescue package for households facing repossession will be the solution to slumping house prices. But these measures indicate that the Bank of England and the Government are at last taking decisive action. The response to this should be an upbeat “better late than never”, rather than a dour “too little, too late” - the immediate reaction of some critics of the proposals, which would allow jobless homeowners with mortgages of less than £400,000 to defer their interest payments for up to two years.

It may be alarming that some of the banks have yet to give the plan their wholehearted support. But it seems unlikely that they could decline to participate in this enforced philanthropy exercise, which could save about 9,000 homeowners from eviction. Even Capital Economics, usually the gloomiest commentator on the housing scene, believes that the rescue scheme could help to slow the pace of price declines next year by limiting the number of repossessed homes that are put up for sale.

However, as Vincent Cable, the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor, points out, the scheme covers only the big banks, which already show forbearance towards struggling borrowers. “Ruthless sub-prime lenders” are not party to the agreement.

These licensed, but still unscrupulous, businesses will continue to exploit legal loopholes to throw borrowers in arrears out of their homes, unless the Government, through the watchdog Financial Services Authority, finally imposes curbs on this shady side of the credit industry.

Those big banks that see themselves as upstanding institutions could help to restore their muchdiminished standing in the eyes of the public by passing on the base-rate cut to existing borrowers. Lower repayments would ensure that fewer households become emergency cases and thus eligible to take the two-year mortgage holiday. The logic of this should appeal to the banks, who would surely wish to have as many paying customers as possible to balance out the charity cases.

Value added or subtracted?

Just what, exactly, are valuers for? Are they driven mostly by the dread of being sued and thus systematically denying deserving homeowners access to the benefits of falling interest rates? Or are they pragmatists who assess how much houses are worth based only on a dispassionate view of the prospects for the market?

Since Bricks&Mortar raised this topic a month ago, we have heard from many readers who are persuaded of the first view. In most cases their homes have been valued at what they see as unreasonably low prices as part of the application process for a remortgage deal.

As a result, these creditworthy homeamp;#33;owners have found themselves excluded from the best mortgage offers - open only to those who are borrowing 75 per cent or less of a property's value. In one case, as we report on page 4, a family's three-bed house was valued at £275,000, although a two-bed neighbouring property had just sold for £325,000.

Was this and other similarly downbeat estimates based on the gloomiest prognostication for prices or the fear of litigation of lenders? Who knows? But it is clear that valuers are becoming almost as unpopular as bankers - except, that is, among the growing number of people who see opportunities in what you might call no-nonsense valuations being put on properties now for sale.

Naomi Heaton, of London Central Properties, a firm that advises on investments in the capital, says that her clients are becoming excited by the return of prices to their 2006 level. Handsome flats in Kensington are now available for more than 20 per cent less a year ago.

Other would-be buyers are also interested in the bargains now appearing in all parts of Britain. They should be aware, however, that lenders are not keen to grant anyone a competitively priced mortgage just now - which is why some are probably secretly delighted by the pessimistic pronouncements of valuers.

Yummy mummy agents

Humour in the housing market just now tends to be of the morbid variety, which is why the “Help Wanted” sign in the window of Barnard Marcus's Notting Hill branch was making passers-by smile last weekend. The estate agency was seeking a “Saturday Negotiator - Yummy Mummy Required”, which suggested that amp;#35;managers were aware of the calibre of person needed for the role of showing houses in London W11, a trophy-wife district, but perhaps not of the legal niceties of employment advertising.

It seems, however, that out-of-work hedge fund managers are still hoping something will turn up and that there is no need to send the high-maintenance missus out to work yet, as there were no applications from this demographic. Georgina Bridges, the branch manager, is now casting around much more widely for candidates.

anne.ashworth@thetimes.co.uk

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