Breaking News
First-time buyers continue to drive house purchase lending.
News release today from the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) headlined ‘First-time buyer lending up 25% in June compared to a year ago’ On an unadjusted basis, in June: Home-owners borrowed £12.3bn for house purchase, up 29% month-on-month and 12% year-on-year. They took out 68,200 loans, up 26% on May and 8% on June 2015. more… On…
Allen Walkey
(IFS) report ‘Brexit Options’
Report released today from the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) headlines ‘Brexit options: budget contributions pale against wider trade and economic impacts’ A new report by IFS researchers, funded by the ESRC and published today: The EU Single Market: The Value of Membership versus Access to the UK looks at what membership of the single…
Allen Walkey
Savills PLC latest half year results
Savills plc, the international real estate advisor, yesterday announced its unaudited results for the six months ended 30 June 2016. Commenting on the results, Jeremy Helsby, Group Chief Executive of Savills plc, said: “Savills has delivered a strong first half performance with revenue growth across the Group. The resilience of our less transactionally focused businesses,…
Allen Walkey
Wales ending the right-to-buy scheme for tenants
The Welsh National Assembly plans to bring forward legislation within the next year to end the Right to Buy scheme for social housing tenants, Scotland has already lost the right to buy their homes since August 1st this year. Welsh First Minister Carwyn Jones reportedly said when announcing the policy: “We must safeguard our social…
Allen Walkey
Homelet Rental Index July
HomeLet yesterday released new data from their rental index which headlined ‘Outlook for rental market strong despite slowing growth in rents’ Rents across the UK continued to rise during July according to new data from Homelet. The outlook for rental market remains strong despite impending tax changes and uncertainties post-Brexit. The index, the most comprehensive…
Allen Walkey
Fracking profits could benefit individual households
The highly controversal method of producing oil and gas by fracking is again under the spotlight, the Prime Minister Theresa May is considering paying the money set aside by a shale wealth fund directly to impacted householders, and not through third party agencies and councils. A shale wealth fund was unveiled in 2014 to set…
Allen Walkey
Housing Market Performance depends on EU Exit Negotiations
According to a recent report from Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) UK house growth is set to slow from 6% in 2015 to 5.7% in 2016 and 2.2% in 2017. New predictions from leading economic forecaster Cebr show that, despite post-Brexit tremors, house prices are set to increase by 5.7% over 2016 as…
Allen Walkey
Halifax (HPI) July
Halifax releases today its House Price Index (HPI) for July headlined ‘Annual house price growth unchanged at 8.4%’ House prices in the three months to July were 8.4% higher than in the same three months of 2015. House prices in the last three months (May-July) were 1.6% higher than in the preceding three months. Martin…
Allen Walkey
Bank of England decides to cut rates
The Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee voted today in favour of a rate cut of 0.25% to a new historic low of 0.25%. The Bank of England Asset purchase facility has been increased to £435B.
Allen Walkey
Interest rate cut expected later this morning from BoE.
The Bank of England (BoE) is expected to cut the base rate later today, experts see it as a ‘foregone conclusion’ that the Monetary Policy Committee will vote in favour at their monthly meeting. The UK’s dominant services sector saw its sharpest fall in seven years according to the Markit/CIPS PMI released yesterday, this followed…
Allen Walkey
Landlords Hit With Extra ‘green tax’
Buy to let landlords are due to be hit with costs of £5,000 from April 2018 to comply with new government energy efficiency legislation introduced on rental properties. The Green Deal scheme which offered loans for improvements is no longer available and the government now expects landlords to finance the improvements themselves. Policy advisor at…
Allen Walkey
Response to Rented Homes Report
In response to the analysis of housing trends in England from the Resolution Foundation, Alan Ward, Chairman of the Residential Landlords Association (RLA) challenges their findings. He points out that the analysis is wrong to claim the private rented sector is not fit for purpose. Mr Ward, said: “The evidence shows that tenants in the…
Allen Walkey
latest PMI survey shows a slowdown in the UK construction industry
Markit/CIPS UK Construction PMI released yesterday tuesday 2nd August headlined ‘UK construction output falls again in July, but new orders decrease at slower pace’ The Markit/CIPS purchasing managers’ index (PMI) dipped to 45.9 in July, down slightly from the figure for June, and well below 50, which indicates market growth. According to the report, the…
Allen Walkey
Home ownership falls to lowest level for 30 years
English home ownership has fallen to levels last seen in 1986 according to analysis by the Resolution Foundation thinktank published today (2/8/2016) The analysis shows that having peaked at 71% in 2003, the proportion of people owning their own home across England has fallen steadily over the last decade by eight percentage points. It shows…
Allen Walkey
Latest new home Registration Statistics from NHBC
According to the National Home Building Council (NHBC) latest new home registration statistics a total of 41,222 new homes were registered in Q2 throughout the UK. In the private sector 31,753 new homes were registered, a 6% increase on the 30,086 a year ago. The public and affordable sector was down 13% with 9,469 new…
Allen Walkey