First-time buyer demand falls sharply
First-time buyer demand falls sharply across Britain’s major cities, with Nottingham leading the decline
The latest research by Yopa has shown that first-time buyer demand has dropped significantly across a number of major British cities, with Nottingham seeing the sharpest decline since the start of the year.
Yopa analysed first-time buyer (FTB) demand based on the proportion of homes listed under buying schemes* that have already sold subject to contract as a percentage of total available stock and how this compares to the start of the year.
The research shows that, across Britain, just 1.8% of current for-sale stock qualifies under such schemes.
Despite this limited availability, demand has also reduced, with just 32.3% of first-time buyer homes finding a buyer in Q3 2025, down from 34% in Q1, a drop of 1.7 percentage points.
In terms of the hottest current markets, Bristol (51.6%), Liverpool (44.3%) and Leeds (42.5%) ranked top for first-time buyer demand in Q3, where 43% to 51%of all FTB homes have found a buyer, albeit all three cities have seen demand cool since the start of the year.
In terms of the largest declines in demand, Nottingham has seen the sharpest reduction since the start of the year, with demand falling from 65.5% to 26.7% (-38.8%).
Other notable quarterly declines include Cardiff (-28.5%), Edinburgh (-28.0%), Newcastle (-23.7%), Liverpool (-19.2%), Leeds (-16.4%) and Sheffield (-13.6%).
However, not all cities are struggling. Leicester has seen the strongest increase in FTB demand so far this year, rising from 39.7% to 45.3% (+5.7%), while Bournemouth (+2.1%) and Birmingham (+1.6%) also posted modest quarterly gains.
Verona Frankish, CEO of Yopa, commented:
“Stronger wage growth and improvements to both the range and affordability of mortgage products in recent months have both helped to boost the ability of first-time buyers when it comes to climbing the property ladder.
However, the high cost of homeownership remains a significant barrier and, since the start of the year, first-time buyer demand levels have fallen across all but a handful of major cities.
Should the Government introduce a stamp duty shake-up in the upcoming Autumn Budget, it would help to significantly boost first-time buyer activity. Unfortunately, this is likely to be wishful thinking, but at the very least, we need to see more homes become available with the added boost of a buying scheme in order to help stimulate the market.”
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