By Charlie Weston Personal Finance Editor
Tuesday May 19 2009

AS many as 340,000 people could now be in negative equity following a sharp fall in house prices.

Being in negative equity means you cannot switch mortgages for a better deal, fund a move to a larger home to start a family, or move house to take a job somewhere else.

Mr Lyons estimates many of the homes bought in the past five years are in negative equity, especially those where a 100pc mortgage was taken out.

But even many of those who took out a mortgage since 2004 with a mortgage for 70pc of the value of the property (ie they had a deposit of 30pc of the value of the property) would also now be in negative equity.

Original Article