Housepresso 27 February 22
Help to Buy Levelling down not up
The latest Help to Buy data revealed that 7,270 homes were purchased using Help to Buy in Q3 2021
This was 46% lower than the year before Q3 2020 and 33% lower than in Q2 2021
The value of help to buy equity loans made in Q3 2021 was £498m, which is 39% lower than in the previous quarter and almost half (48% lower) than Q3 2020
In a world where the GOvernment is keen to level up the UK housing market, have the changes to help to buy led to it actually levelling down?
Are house prices falling where you live?
Whilst we read many headlines about house prices rising, they are not rising everywhere. Click the link below to see if you live in one of the worst-performing housing markets in the UK...
Housing transactions start 2022 on the up
New data released by HMRC this week revealed that the seasonally adjusted UK housing transactions in January 2022 were 106,990
This is 10.6% lower than January 2021 and 5.1% higher than December 2021, a strong start for the new year
Rightmove heads they win, tails they win
Rightmove has delivered a record set of results in 2021 with ARPA at a new high and operating margins once again above 75%, meaning that 75p out of every pound of revenue is pure profit. Our obsession with property remains and Rightmove remains keen to capitalise on our nation's legal addiction.
However, there was a moment, when estate agents had finally had enough of Rightmove.
Twindig Housing Market Index
Investor confidence in the housing market took a hit as developments in Ukraine weighed on investors' minds. The Twindig Housing Market Index fell by 6.5% to 80.2, its biggest fall since 11 December 2020. Concerns about bank's willingness to lend and the sobering impact of war on a household's decisions to move house appeared to drive investor confidence in the housing market downwards. In our view, investors tend to react quickly and abruptly to new information and we expect that on reflection their concerns for the operation of a very domestic market may lessen.