Tag Archives: london
Property prices in England and Wales up for ninth month in a row
Property prices in England and Wales increased by 0.4% in September, the ninth month in a row when values have grown, taking the average price to £284,742, the latest index shows. Year on year prices increased by 4.2% and overall average house prices across England and Wales have risen £11,500 in the last year, after 42 months of annual growth, the LSL index also shows. The London housing market moved upwards after a period of decline with its biggest monthly price rise since June 2014 at xxx and the South Est saw the strongest year on year rise of any region. The growth is primarily being underpinned by sturdy demand and solid activity at the bottom of the property ladder, according to Richard Sexton, director of e.surv chartered surveyors. ‘The most frequently paid property price across England and Wales is just £125,000, mirroring the level at which stamp duty becomes payable, and reflecting the impetus that has been injected in the first-time buyer market recently,’ he said. ‘It is also the lower to mid-range properties priced between £180,000 and £360,000 which are seeing the fastest increases in value, while the shift in stamp duty bands continues to slow growth at the higher end of the market, and prices above £600,000 are largely stationary,’ he explained. He also pointed out that a price surge in London in September has halted its stalled market. ‘As in the rest of the country, it’s the more affordably priced London boroughs which are behind this renaissance, as the strengthening of sterling, rising stamp duty rates and moves against non-doms take their toll on the high end market,’ he said. The index shows that the 10 London boroughs with the lowest average house prices all set new record highs in August, and it is Barking and Dagenham, at the very bottom of the price rankings, that recorded the fastest year on year increase in property values at 15.7%. ‘While London is once again leading the pack in terms of monthly price growth, the South East region has soared two places in the rankings to top the charts with the highest annual increase in property values. Average house prices in the South East have grown 5.8% over the past twelve months,’ said Sexton. ‘Combined, these two regions are now having a much greater influence on national measures of price growth. Compared to July, when they were only pushing up the overall annual change by 0.1%, this has grown to 0.7%. As house price growth becomes more southern-centric again, the London commuter belt is spurring some of the fastest rates of change with Luton witnessing the steepest price rise compared to last year, jumping 14.9%,’ he added. Sexton also pointed that it has been the strongest September for home sales since 2007. Monthly sales totalled 84,000, an increase of 3% from August, and making September only the second month this year in which sales have overtaken 2014 levels. Meanwhile, the… Continue reading
Auckland property market gets boost after three cooler months
The average sales price of a property in Auckland, New Zealand increased by 1.9% in September to $836,275, the latest published data shows. The median sales price reached $790,000, a rise of 4.6%, the data from real estate firm Barfoot & Thompson also shows with the firm also reporting an extremely active month with sales up 3.4% month on month and up 41.6% compared to a year ago. Peter Thompson, managing director of Barfoot & Thompson, said that nearly a third of all homes sold were for in excess of $1 million, which is the highest number of $1 million plus homes ever sold in a month. ‘You have to go back to June this year to see a similar lift in values in one month to that we experienced in September. In part the price surge may be down to buyers getting in ahead of the new regulations around equity ratios for investors, which came into force in October, but without doubt an element of the traditional lift that comes with spring was there,’ he explained. Some 11.9% of all homes sold were properties for under $500,000. This is significantly lower than the 14.3% of sales in August in this sector or the 31.8% recorded in September last year. New listings at 1,940 were the highest in a September for 12 years, and created a reasonable level of choice, he also pointed out, which has given a boost to the residential real estate market following three months of cooling. ‘Whether September’s prices have set a trend for the remainder of the year has yet to be seen,’ said Thompson who also pointed out that new regulations for international buyers are due to come into force in November and these have coincided with a tightening of requirements around the export of money out of China. ‘In the last week of the month there was a falloff in sales made under the hammer at auctions, and there was less pressure on buyers to make immediate decisions. This end of the month development carries with it a note of caution that September’s prices may not prove to be the start of a new round of increases, and that buyer’s may not be prepared to overstretch themselves to secure a property. The future direction of prices still remains at the crossroads,’ he added. Continue reading
Property tax changes in England and Scotland weigh on prime country house market
Prime country house prices in the UK rose by 0.7% between July and September, continuing the modest upward trend of growth that started in early 2013, the latest research report shows. Prices have shifted upwards now for 11 consecutive quarters with annual growth also up slightly to 2.7% on average, up from 2.3% in the second quarter but down from a recent high of 5.2% in 2014. The market continues to feel the impact of the increased cost of stamp duty, following the Autumn Statement in December 2014, according to the report from real estate firm Knight Frank. It says that this continues to weigh on both price growth and activity at the top end of the market. In fact, the latest figures from the Land Registry show that between January and July there have been 35% fewer sales with a value above £1.5m outside of London compared to the same period last year. The prime market below £1.5 million has been less affected by these tax changes and prices for homes in this sector have risen by nearly 4% annually over the year to September. In comparison, over the same time properties priced above £1.5 million, the point at which the 12% rate of stamp duty kicks in, have risen by 2%. Under £1.5 million, price growth has generally been underpinned by demand for homes in urban centres. Price growth in town and city markets including Bristol, Bath and Oxford for example, where buyers continue to be attracted by good schooling, amenities and transport links, has outperformed the wider prime market. ‘There remains a significant price differential between property prices in the prime country market and in London, while anecdotal evidence from agents suggests that there is pent up demand from buyers in the Home Counties and the South West. This could help underpin prices and an increase in activity levels across the market as the year progresses,’ the report says. However, the average prime country house price is still 14% below its 2007 peak. In contrast, prime prices in London are, on average, 34% higher than their previous peak values. ‘The rise in London prices in the last few years means that buyers looking to swap the city for the country are able to get a lot more property for their money, with such buyers able to take advantage of the relative discount which currently exists,’ the report adds. In Scotland the country house market has also been affected by tax changes with the new Land and Buildings Transaction Tax (LBTT) being introduced in April 2015. The report shows that as a result prices fell by 0.7% between July and September, the first time that prime prices have fallen on a quarterly basis in over two years. The report points out that the levy, which replaced Stamp Duty Land Tax, has resulted in a significant increase in purchase costs for buyers in the prime market and adds that negotiations between buyer and… Continue reading
