ESTATE agents in Worcester have broadly welcomed new Government measures to tackle the stagnating property market but have warned the problem has no “quick fixes”.

The threshold at which house stamp duty will apply is rising from £125,000 to £175,000 for a year, from today.

Alistair Darling, Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced the move yesterday, along with a package of other measures aimed at kick-starting the ailing property market.

Worcester’s estate agents welcomed the announcement but called for further action.

Although rentals remain strong, the city’s property sales have been hit by the continuing fall-out from the credit crunch with banks tightening lending.

Charles Robinson, owner of Worcester estate agents Griffiths and Charles in Foregate Street, has more than 25 years’ experience in the business and is a spokesman for the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors.

“It’s a quick fix but the market isn’t going to be quick fix,” he said. “People have to realise it is a long-term problem.

“It took eight years for prices to start rising again following the housing problems in the late 1980s.”

Mr Robinson said that the threshold change did nothing to solve the issues of would-be buyers desperately saving for a deposit or sellers who needed to get used to the fact prices had to come down.

First-time buyers Karen Young, of St John’s, and partner Clive Smith, said the Government’s measures did not fill them with confidence.

Mr Smith, aged 35, said: “Mr Darling has to do something but it’s beyond his means to solve. You have to let the natural progression take place.”

Martin McCreath, Your Move’s local area sales director, said: “We welcome any changes which encourage more movement in the housing market and feel this is something buyers have been waiting for, particularly first- time buyers, since earlier speculation that changes were to be introduced.”

He said the Government should go further and make the threshold change permanent, calling for a wider review of stamp duty.

David Stuart-Smith, Andrew Grant executive officer, said: “The long-awaited stamp duty announcement can at last release the brakes which Mr Darling so clumsily applied to the housing market a few weeks ago.

“Any resultant sales will then influence activity within the entire market.”

He said the “token of encouragement” should now be followed up by lending institutions.

The Bank of England released new figures showing national mortgage approvals had fallen again in July, to 33,000, and are at their lowest since records began in 1993.