Tag Archives: news
UK home owner lending down month on month which CML says is usual winter dip
Home owner house purchase lending totalled £10.7 billion in November, down 9% on October but up 18% on November 2014. The latest data from the Council of Mortgage Lenders also shows that first time buyers borrowed £4.2 billion, down 9% on October but up 14% on November last year. Home movers took out 32,300 loans, down 10% month on month and up 9% compared to November 2014. In total, this was £6.5 billion borrowed, down 10% on October but up 20% year on year. Home-owner remortgage activity was down 9% by volume and 14% by value compared to October. Compared to November 2014, remortgage lending was up 24% by volume and up 36% by value. Gross buy to let lending fell month on month, down 6% by volume and 8% by value, but the substantial growth year on year continued. ‘As expected, mortgage lending activity eased back as the normal dip in the winter months began,’ said Paul Smee, director general of the CML. ‘There was still growth across all lending types in November compared to the year earlier suggesting continued improvement. Our forecasts anticipate that gross lending will continue a slow but steady upward trajectory over the next two years,’ he added. A breakdown of the figures shows that house purchase lending in the UK in November saw a decrease month on month by volume and by value of mortgages advanced, but compared to November 2014 volumes and amount borrowed overall increased. As previously reported, UK gross lending overall in November totalled £20.5 billion, down 6% on October but up year on year by 27% compared to November 2014. This was the highest lending level in the month of November since 2007. First time buyer lending declined by volume and by value compared to October, but saw a year on year increase in loan numbers and amount borrowed. Competitive mortgage rates mean first time buyers continue to pay low levels of their monthly household income to service the capital and interest rate payments of their mortgage at 18.3% in November, joint lowest average percentage level since we began tracking this in 2005 alongside June and September 2015. Home movers borrowed £6.5 billion in November, this was down compared to October but was the highest November level since 2007. Home movers spent 18.2% of their monthly gross household income to pay capital and interest repayments, unchanged on October but a decrease compared to November 2014. Remortgage activity saw a decrease by volume and by value in November compared to October, but increased year on year to have the highest volume of remortgage loans in the month of November since 2011 and the most borrowed in the month of November since 2008. Gross buy to let lending decreased in November compared to October but was substantially up on last year. Buy to let remortgage continues to be the driver of… Continue reading
Bristol and Cambridge were most searched locations for homes in 2015
Bristol is the most searched city for property hunters in the UK, followed by Cambridge, according to new research from online property portal Rightmove. Margate has seen the highest asking price hikes and Welwyn Garden City is where properties have sold the quickest with March the busiest month of the year in terms of browsing for real estate. There were 110 million visits from home hunters each month to Rightmove in 2015, as demand for property hit an all-time high and supply issues in many parts of the country remained. Whilst the busiest month was March, the busiest day for browsing property was actually later in the year on Monday 10 August when home hunters browsed over 58.6 million pages of property, a common time of year for people to try and find a new home to be settled in before Christmas. Bristol and Cambridge came first and second for potential buyers and renters searching for property in 2015 outside London, with almost 14 million searches in these two places over the year. York was in third place for buying and Manchester came third for rental searches. Commuter towns Milton Keynes and Reading made the top 10 searches for both renting and buying, perhaps as people looked for more affordable options outside of the capital. Some areas fared particularly well in 2015 outside London, with new seller asking prices in a few locations going up by more than 20%. The seaside town of Margate in Kent saw the price of property coming to market go up by 24.2% to £204,631 between January and the end of November, followed closely by Altrincham in Cheshire with a rise of 21.9% to £484,258. The rest of the top five is made up of towns in Kent with Gravesend recording a rise of 20.5%, Ramsgate up 18.6% and Dartford up 17.4%. The average time for a property to sell across England and Wales was 62 days throughout 2015. Properties in Welwyn Garden City sold fastest outside London, spending an average of only 25 days on the site before being marked as sold, with nearby Hertford coming in second place with an average of 26 days. Places in the East of England dominated the top 10 fastest to sell list, as many parts of the region recorded strong growth. As the year ended, the annual new seller asking price increase in the East of England is 9.2%, recording the same rise as the South East. ‘2015 saw demand reach record levels for home hunters both buying and renting, and the ripple effect from London to the South East moved even further out to places like Essex and Hertfordshire, as you can see from how quick properties are selling in these locations,’ said Rightmove’s housing expert Sam Mitchell . ‘Usually January is Rightmove’s busiest month but the New Year rush stayed even longer this year, and we recorded our busiest ever month in March. It’ll be interesting to see… Continue reading
Generation of UK home owners stuck due to lack of downsize properties
A lack of suitable homes for downsizing is preventing a large number of home owners in the UK from moving to a smaller property, it is claimed. Some 33% of home owners aged 55 and over are considering or expect to consider downsizing, but a lack of suitable options is preventing them from moving, a new report says. A new YouGov survey for the report found 29% who have already downsized or are considering or expecting to consider downsizing did or expect to release in excess of £100,000 in equity, with the most prevalent way of using the money being to put it in a savings account. The report, Generation Stuck: Exploring the Reality of Downsizing in Later Life, has been written by the International Longevity Centre UK and commissioned by retirement house builder McCarthy & Stone. The report suggests that a 'Generation Stuck' dilemma is being created by a substantial number of older people who want to move and downsize, but can't due to a lack of choice in the market place. A chronic under supply of suitable properties for later life, including purpose built retirement housing, means the UK is running out of homes for its ageing population, leaving them stuck in under occupied properties unsuited to their needs. According to previous research findings some 52% of all people who classify as under occupiers in the UK are aged 55 and over and at current market trends, it would take 20 years for housing supply, at its current rate, to meet the demand of just half of people aged 60 and over interested in downsizing. As part of the report, a new YouGov survey found 48% of the 1,252 home owners surveyed would consider downsizing or have already moved to a more suitable property, making this an area worthy of much greater policy consideration by Government. Of those who have already downsized or are at least considering downsizing some 56% wanted to do so to spend less on property maintenance, 43% wanted to reduce their bills and 43% wanted to move as their children had left home. The finding that almost three in 10 home owners aged 55 or over expect to release more than £100,000 in equity from downsizing is reinforced by McCarthy & Stone's figures which show its home owners released an average of almost £60,000 in equity when downsizing to a retirement apartment, with 19% releasing more than £100,000. The report also details how these home owners used, or plan to use, such equity. Some 35% wanted to put it into a savings account, 30% to enhance their day to day life, and 19% to give it to family members. Of those aged 55 to 59 34% wanted to put it towards a pension. ‘Housing and planning policy should not just be about starter homes. Millions of older people want to downsize to more suitable housing but there is currently little incentive or choice for them to move…. Continue reading
