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Residential sales in Spain record highest growth since January 2013
Residential property sales in Spain increased by 23.6% in May year on year, the highest figures since January 2013, the latest official figures show. The figures from the National Statistics Institute also show that home sales have now increased year on year for four months in a row. However, sales did fall back slightly from the year on year figure of 29% recorded in April. The second hand market and, to a lesser extent, sales of new homes, were responsible for the May increase, up by 26.7% and 12% year on year respectively. The data also shows that in the first five months of the year home sales increased by 15.8% compared with the same period of 2015, with second hand homes up 21.9% but new house sales down 3.4% over the five months. Month on month sales growth has slowed. Compared with April sales in May 2016 were up by 3.5% but this was the lowest increase registered in this month in the past five years. The highest numbers of home sales per 100,000 inhabitants were registered in the Balearic Islands and La Rioja and Andalucía was the region to register most home sales, followed by Catalonia, Valencia and Madrid. In contrast, the regions which registered the least home sales in May were La Rioja, Navarre and Cantabria but in relative terms, home sales rose in all of Spain’s regions except for Navarre, which registered a decline of 20.2% compared with May 2015. The most significant increases were in the Balearic Islands with growth of 70%, followed by La Rioja up 68.9% and Murcia up 61.8%, while the lower increases were in Cantabria with sales growth of just 1.7% and Galicia up 7.8%. Continue reading
UK house prices up 1.8% in second quarter of 2016, but stagnant in London
UK house prices increased by 1.8% during the second quarter of 2016 and were up 8.5% compared to the same period a year earlier, according to the latest quarterly index data. This took the typical price of a standardised UK property to a record of £215,582 from £211,868 in the first quarter of 2016, the Halifax House Price Index administered by market shows. The data also shows that London house prices have increased more than double the UK average and nearly four times greater than in Northern Ireland despite stagnating in the second quarter of the year while prices in Scotland and Wales fell. Also, the annual increase of 8.5% during the second quarter was the lowest recorded since the third quarter of 2015 but house prices have now risen on a quarterly basis for 15 successive quarters, and prices are also up some 36.6% since the height of the financial crisis in the spring of 2009. But overall, considerable regional variations in terms of both house price inflation and standard house price levels continued into the second quarter of 2016. London, followed by the South East, remain by far the most expensive areas to purchase housing, with the average house price in the capital currently pushing close to £450,000. With the lowest prices in Northern Ireland at £119,000, the gap between the most expensive and cheapest regions is at a new record of just under £330,000. That said, in a sign that April’s stamp duty changes have perhaps taken some heat out of the London market, prices were unchanged in the second quarter following a 7.2% rise in the previous quarter, although they remained well up on a year earlier at 14.6%. Along with the South East with growth of 13.9%, house price inflation in London was the strongest seen in the UK. Outside of these two regions, no others recorded double digit house price rises with most registering considerable slowdowns compared to the previous quarter. In Scotland prices fell 1.6% and were down by 0.6% in Wales while the rate of growth in Northern Ireland fell sharply to just 3.5%. Moreover, house prices in Northern Ireland are still some 48% down on their peak seen in the second quarter of 2007. Indeed, in Wales prices remain close to 10% down on pre-financial crisis levels and Scotland some 6.4% down. Other regions currently recording house price levels below pre-financial crisis highs include the North down 6.9% and the North West down 2.5%. ‘The UK housing market showed signs of cooling in the spring, with the annual rate of inflation slowing to 8.5%. Although average prices moved 1.8% higher than the first quarter, only six of the 12 UK regions saw house prices rise in the three months to June, with prices falling in five regions and stagnating in London,’ said Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit. ‘This is the first time that prices have failed to rise in London since late 2012. The… Continue reading
Buy to let lending via limited companies up in the UK in first half of 2016
Lending to buy to let investors borrowing via limited companies in the UK grew in the first half of the year according to the latest data to be published and the number of lenders and products available to limited company borrowers also increased. According to transactional data the number of buy to let mortgage applications completed by limited companies grew to 30% of all buy to let completions, up from 21% in the second half 2015, and 18% in the first half of 2015. By volume the number grew to 30% of all buy to let loans, up from 25% in the second half of 2015 and 20% in the first half of 2015, according to the buy to let data from Mortgages for Business. It also shows that the number of lenders offering products to limited company borrowers also increased in the first half of the year to 14 from 12 in the second half of 2015. The rise was due to existing buy to let lenders introducing limited company products rather than new lenders entering the buy to let sector. Lenders offering limited company products now account for 42% of the whole buy to let lending sector, up from 30% in the first half of 2016. Product numbers increased to an average of 154, up from 147 in the last six months of 2015, although the actual proportion of them as a percentage of the whole buy to let market fell due to the increase in product numbers available to individual borrowers. Whilst average products numbers for limited companies accounted for 13% of all buy to let products in the first half of 2016 but by the end of June the percentage had risen back to 16% of all buy to let products, the same percentage recorded in the first half of 2015. ‘Both applications and completions for limited company borrowers appear to have stabilised at around one third of all buy to let business,’ said David Whittaker, managing director of Mortgages for Business. ‘However this masks a dramatic change in the investment pattern for new purchases where the proportion investing through limited companies has risen from less than 20% by number or 25% by value in the first half of 2015 to over 50% in 2016, with second quarter applications by limited companies running at over 60% of total applications related to purchases of buy to let properties. This increasing proportion will also drive an increase in the proportion of completions in the next quarter,’ he explained. He pointed out that there has only been a slight uplift in the proportion of remortgaging activity that relates to limited company borrowers, due to historical investment patterns. ‘It would, however, appear that some landlords who already own property personally are sitting on their hands somewhat and holding back from remortgaging, probably waiting to see how the economy pans out post-referendum,’ he said. ‘With the Chancellor announcing his intentions to lower corporation… Continue reading
