Category Archives: Property

Mortgage reforms have excluded first-time buyers, say UK building societies

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Report calls for overhaul of rules on loan affordability and repayment, and more flexible mortgage products

Mortgage reforms introduced after the 2008 banking crisis have “tilted too far” in support of financial stability to the point that first-time buyers are being excluded from the housing market, building societies have warned.

A report commissioned by the Building Societies Association has called for an overhaul of affordability and repayment rules, which they say have contributed to a steady decline in first-time buyer mortgages since the mid-2000s.

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Private tenants in Scotland face ‘big rent rises and mass evictions’ from April

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Campaigners say renters served notices of increases of 30% to 60% in advance of cap and other emergency protections ending

Private tenants in Scotland are facing big rent rises and mass evictions as emergency protections expire at the end of next month, campaigners have warned.

The Scottish government has “in effect rubber-stamped rent increases from April”, says Ruth Gilbert, the national campaigns chair of the Scotland-wide tenants’ union Living Rent, while transitional measures are inadequate and confusing, leaving many unaware what their legal rights are.

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UK house prices rise at fastest rate since January 2023

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Lower mortgage rates lead to increased buyer and seller confidence, says Halifax

UK house prices rose 2.5% in the year to January, recording the biggest increase since January last year, as lower mortgage rates and fading inflationary pressures led to increased buyer and seller confidence, Halifax has said.

January marked the fourth consecutive monthly rise, with a 1.3% uplift on December, the UK’s biggest mortgage lender said, with the average home costing £291,000, £3,9000 more than in December.

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Private rents in Great Britain hit record high, data shows

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Rightmove says average advertised price outside London is up 9.2% on a year ago despite fall in some regions

Average private rents in Great Britain have climbed to new record highs, though in some regions there has been a small fall in the amount new tenants are being asked to pay, data shows.

The typical advertised private rent outside London for new properties coming on to the market rose to a record £1,280 a calendar month in the final quarter of 2023, according to the property website Rightmove. That is £2 higher than the £1,278 figure recorded in the third quarter – a sign that rental growth is slowing.

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Lifetime Isas: calls to increase price cap that ‘fines’ first-time buyers

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People who want to buy property costing more than £450,000 say they unfairly face losing money

Campaigners are pressing for changes to a UK government scheme for would-be first-time buyers that “fines” people if they use it to buy a home costing more than £450,000.

Martin Lewis, the founder of MoneySavingExpert.com, is among those calling for an urgent revamp of the rules that apply to lifetime Isas, which let people save for a first home or for their retirement.

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London borough of Richmond is ‘happiest place to live in Great Britain’

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Access to huge parks, restaurants and transport links plus a Ted Lasso-factor lead area to top Rightmove’s ‘happy at home’ index

It is home to London’s largest royal park as well as big-hitting tourist attractions such as Kew Gardens and Hampton Court Palace, and has more recently become a place of pilgrimage for fans of the hit TV comedy Ted Lasso. Now, the borough of Richmond upon Thames in south-west London has been named “the happiest place to live” in Great Britain.

It received the accolade from property website Rightmove, which runs a “happy at home” index – now in its 12th year – where it asks residents how they feel about their area based on 13 “happiness factors”.

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UK house prices rise for third straight month as mortgage rates fall

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Nationwide says average property price was £258,557 in November, £5,231 down on same month last year

UK house prices rose for a third consecutive month in November as the market responded to hopes that mortgage rate costs had peaked.

Nationwide, the UK’s biggest building society, said prices rose 0.2% month on month in November, after a 0.9% rise in October and a 0.1% rise in September. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast a 0.4% fall in prices in November.

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UK needs more lab space if it wants to be science superpower, ministers told

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Leading property firms also call for more tax breaks and improved transport links to hubs ahead of autumn statement

The UK needs to build more laboratory space, improve transport links and offer more tax breaks to achieve Rishi Sunak’s ambition of becoming a science superpower, two leading property firms have argued ahead of the autumn statement.

Demand for laboratories in the UK is growing fast, with lab vacancy rates of just 1% in Cambridge and London, and 7% in Oxford, according to a report by British Land, one of Britain’s biggest property developers, and the upmarket estate agency and advisory firm Savills.

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Average UK house sale price suffers first annual fall for 11 years

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ONS says average price dropped 0.1% year on year in September, with those in London decreasing 1.1%

The average price of a home in the UK dropped by 0.1% in the year to September, official figures show – the first annual fall for more than a decade.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) figures, which are based on completed sales, have shown annual price inflation slowing since July 2022, when the headline rate stood at 13.8%.

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UK housing market is past its ‘peak pain’, declares Savills

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Upmarket estate agent says prices will start to bottom out in 2024 as interest rates fall and will return to growth in 2025

Britain’s housing market is past “peak pain” and prices look likely to bottom out by next summer, according to the estate agency Savills.

The average UK house price is projected to fall by 3% in 2024, after a 4% drop this year, the upmarket estate agent and property advisory firm said in its five-year outlook.

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Tory MPs to challenge government if leaseholds ban does not apply to flats

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Exclusive: Measure in planned bill stopping sale of new properties under leasehold in England and Wales likely to only cover houses

Tory MPs are preparing to force the government to toughen up its planned leasehold reforms in England and Wales, with Downing Street expected to launch a bill that falls short of campaigners’ demands.

Conservative backbenchers say they are ready to bring amendments to the long-awaited leasehold reform bill, which will be one of the centrepieces of next week’s king’s speech but will not end leasehold on the majority of properties.

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UK house prices will not stop falling until 2025, Lloyds predicts

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Britain’s biggest mortgage lender forecasts 5% drop over this year and another 2.4% decline in 2024

UK house prices will continue to slide this year and in 2024 and will not start to recover until 2025, Lloyds Banking Group has forecast.

The lender, which owns Halifax and is Britain’s largest mortgage provider, said that by the end of 2023 UK house prices would have fallen 5% over the course of the year and were likely to decrease by another 2.4% in 2024.

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Buyer’s market fuels fastest fall in UK house prices in 14 years

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High mortgage costs result in sixth straight month of sellers being forced to reduce prices, says Halifax

UK house prices fell at the fastest annual rate in 14 years in September, as high mortgage costs fuelled a sixth consecutive monthly drop in a “buyer’s market”, according to Halifax.

Halifax, Britain’s biggest mortgage lender, said prices fell by 4.7% in September, the biggest year-on-year decrease since 2009.

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Supply shortages and mortgage rate rises push UK rents to highest point ever

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Average rental property receives three times more enquiries from prospective tenants than in 2019

Private home rents in Great Britain have increased to their highest point on record after shortages in supply and mortgage rate rises combined to push the cost up by 10% over the past 12 months.

The average rent for new properties being put on the market now stands at a record £1,278 per calendar month outside London in the July to September period, according to Rightmove.

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UK mortgage approvals hit six-month low as interest rates cool market

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Number of house sales also fell in August compared with a year earlier, says HMRC

UK mortgage approvals fell in August to their lowest level in six months, as high interest rates cooled the housing market.

The Bank of England said net mortgage approvals for house purchases fell from 49,500 in July to 45,400 in August and were down by a third from the same month last year.

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First-time buyers in UK drop by a fifth as higher mortgage costs bite

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Lender says homes needing renovation are most in demand as people seek cheaper properties

The number of first-time buyers in the UK has fallen by more than a fifth, while homes in need of renovation are most in demand as buyers look for cheaper properties, in the latest evidence that people are struggling with higher mortgage costs.

There were 22% fewer first-time buyers between January and August compared with the same period last year, according to the mortgage lender Halifax. They still accounted for more than half (53%) of all home loans agreed in the first eight months of this year, similar to a year earlier (52%).

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Proportion of UK house sellers cutting asking price reaches ‘highest in over a decade’

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More than 36% of properties have had asking price cut at least once — the highest figure since 2011

UK house sellers are cutting their asking prices at the fastest rate in more than a decade, after high interest rates dampened demand for property this summer.

The proportion of homes on the market which have had at least one price reduction is at its highest level since January 2011, the property website Rightmove has reported.

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New £1bn government upgrade to plug Great Britain’s draughtiest homes

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Households could save £400 a year on energy bills via means-tested insulation scheme

Households could save up to £400 a year on energy bills under a new means-tested scheme to insulate more than 300,000 of Great Britain’s draughtiest homes.

The government is spending £1bn on grants for homes that have low energy efficiency ratings and are in lower council tax bands.

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UK ‘mortgage meltdown’ looms amid ‘terrifying’ growth in arrears

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Jump in borrowers unable to make payments with landlords particularly hit and ‘worse to come’

Mortgage arrears jumped by 13% in the second quarter of the year to the highest level since 2016, according to Bank of England figures that underscore the stress in the UK mortgage market.

Rising interest rates and unemployment over recent months have put pressure on household disposable incomes, forcing some families to cut or suspend their monthly mortgage payments.

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UK house prices fall at fastest rate since 2009, says Nationwide

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August 5.3% drop comes as sales completions down by about 40% in first half of year compared with 2021

UK house prices fell 5.3% in August compared with the same month last year, the fastest annual drop in 14 years, according to Nationwide Building Society.

The lender said the fall, which was the biggest since July 2009, when the global economy was in the depths of the financial crisis, was driven by soaring mortgage costs, which are putting off potential buyers. Average house prices are more than £14,500 lower than they were a year ago and mortgage approvals have plummeted by a fifth compared with pre-pandemic levels.

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