Though your chances of taking a person at random off the street and engaging them in a detailed and impassioned conversation about stocks in the UK mining sector are remote, ask most people for their view on the housing market and you'll never be short on opinion. The reasoning for this is obvious, movements in the housing market affect us all.

Be it the young person struggling to get on that all-important first rung, or the buy-to-let investor lamenting interest rate rises damaging their rental yield, movements in the price of bricks and mortar matter.

This is why the statement accompanying North-East house builder Barratt's full-year results last week might give us food for thought.

For Barratt's, which recently joined the UK market's elite in rising to the FTSE 100, saw pre-tax profit rise more than nine per cent, and has a strong order book for 2007-8, all should be rosy in the garden - or so one would have thought.

The ongoing "credit crunch", warned the statement, coupled with high interest rates, has spooked the consumer. Mortgages have also become more costly and difficult to obtain as lenders protect themselves.

Fewer buyers will mean less demand, which could signal cooling in house price inflation.

The property sector as a whole is extremely reliant on the availability of credit. There are not many of us who can just turn out their pockets and pay for a house in one fell swoop.

It may seem inevitable then that if the credit drip is taken away, the sector will get ill.

Barratt itself reported a ten per cent fall in home sales during the week following the Northern Rock debacle and, in the process, became the first company from outside the financial sector to place results in the context of the Northern Rock fall-out, an indication of how widely the effects may yet be felt.

Before we all panic, however, it is encouraging that house prices defied the turmoil in credit markets during the past month to rise by 0.7 per cent, says Nationwide Building Society, pointing to an increase of 8.4 per cent for the year, an attractive return indeed.

This is all well and good, but mortgage brokers are still seeing fit to revise down their annual growth rate forecasts.

Why? Because they know that high interest rates make it more expensive for banks and building societies to borrow the money to lend to us (that's part of the reason Northern Rock first got into trouble) and they are not going to pay for it. No, I'm afraid those higher costs would be passed onto the consumer through higher interest on mortgage repayments.

But wait, good news is just around the corner.

Having raised rates five times since August last year, the Bank of England seems now to have inflation under control, and all signs are that, inflation shocks notwithstanding, we have seen the last of the rises.

Adding to this, the fact that the Bank of England may want to release some pressure in credit markets, we may even have a rate cut before Christmas.

Yes, the housing sector may slow down, but the chances of anything more sinister are currently slim indeed. The last time the housing market crashed, interest rates had risen sharply and the economy was more fragile than Michael Owen.

After years of house price growth, disaster is still not a case of "when"; it's a reassuring case of "if".

* Nick Williams is an investment advisor in the Teesside office of Wise Speke, and can be contacted on 0845-213-1340. Views expressed are the author's own and are not necessarily held throughout the Brewin Dolphin Group. Wise Speke is a division of Brewin Dolphin Securities Ltd, a member of the London Stock Exchange, authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. Prices, values or income may fall against investors' interests. You should be aware that you may get less back than you invested. Investments may not always be suitable for all individuals. If you have any doubts, you should consult a professional advisor.