The UK’s largest building society said that prices in September were up 10% compared with a year earlier, a slight slowdown from 11% in August.

The double-digit rise was driven by recent activity in Wales and Northern Ireland, the lender said, with London still seeing the slowest growth.

The typical home now costs £248,742.   Buyers Guide

Rapidly rising house prices continues to create financial problems for potential first-time buyers, despite record low mortgage rates being offered by lenders.

A recent report by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said that people in tourist hotspots – which have become increasingly popular for relocating buyers – were at risk of being priced out of buying a home in the areas where they worked.

Nationwide bases its house price estimates on its mortgage data, and Robert Gardner, the building society’s chief economist, said that property values had continued to rise more quickly than earnings, which meant affordability was becoming more stretched.

“Raising a deposit remains the main barrier for most prospective first-time buyers. A 20% deposit on a typical first-time buyer home is now around 113% of gross income – a record high,” he said.

Properties for sale in Durham

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In July 2020, the government announced a cut to help buyers whose finances were affected by Covid.

Until 31 March 2021, home buyers didn’t have to pay stamp duty on the first £500,000 of a purchase price.

This meant a saving of up to £15,000.

The government later extended the tax holiday until 30 June, and then again until 30 September.

During this period home buyers didn’t have to pay stamp duty on the first £250,000:

From 1 October 2021, rates return to pre-Covid levels. That means the point you start paying stamp duty will be £125,001:

£0-£125,000 = 0%
£125,001-£250,000 = 2%
£250,001-£925,000 = 5%
£925,001-£1,500,000 = 10%
£1,500,001+ = 12%
You can use our Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) calculator to find out how much you will pay.

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In her second big housing pledge in as many days, the Prime Minister will announce support for people aged between 23 and 40 to buy their first homes by helping 30 areas around the country to unlock land to build on.

The new homes will be started early this year and be available to buy from 2018, ministers have said. The housing will also help to reinvigorate town centres through new investment and development of green spaces.

Theresa May promised earlier this week that 14 new garden villages and three new garden towns would be built across Britain CREDIT: GETTY
It follows a promise Mrs May made earlier this week to build 14 new garden villages and three new garden towns across Britain. The project is designed to boost housing stock quickly to help tackle a shortage of homes.

Mrs May has promised to focus her efforts as Prime Minister on helping those who are “just about managing” to make ends meet, and those who are struggling to get on the property ladder or save enough for a deposit.

Announcing the starter homes package today, housing minister Gavin Barwell will say: “This government is committed to building starter homes to help young first-time buyers get on the housing ladder.

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“This first wave of partnerships shows the strong local interest to build thousands of starter homes on hundreds of brownfield sites in the coming years. One in three councils has expressed an interest to work with us so far.”
Watch | New garden villages could provide 48,000 homes
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The homes will be given financial support from the Government and will be sold by developers at a 20 per cent discount to help young people who have saved to get a mortgage.

Thirty new partnerships with local councils will be announced on Tuesday, chosen for their potential for early completion. Many more authorities applied to the fund for help to develop brownfield sites and 71 have already received investment.

But John Healey, Labour’s shadow housing secretary, said: “These so-called ‘starter homes’ are a symbol of the Conservative record on housing.

“Ministers launched them in 2014 but will only start to build the first in 2017, promised they’d be affordable for young people when they’ll cost up to £450,000, and pledged to build 200,000 by 2020, but no one now believes that’s possible.”

Liverpool is one of the councils which has won funding for new homes
The £1.2 billion Starter Home Land Fund, which was established in April last year, is designed to support the  “acquisition, remediation and de-risking” of land suitable for housing around the country, ministers said.

Councils, including those in Liverpool, Plymouth, Worthing and Blackpool, and the City of London, have made successful bids.

Roger Harding, a director of housing charity Shelter, said: “Efforts to build more homes are welcome but these starter homes are only likely to benefit people who are better off and already close to buying.

“Sadly they will do little to help the many millions of people on middle and low incomes who need somewhere genuinely affordable to buy or rent long term.”

He said the new homes should be in addition to, but should not replace, other affordable housing.

Durham Properties For Sale 

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House prices have picked up speed for the first time since March, but will slow in the next year as the market loses momentum.

Halifax’s price index recorded a 6pc annual increase in house prices in the three months to November, up from last month’s figure of 5.2pc. Home prices increased by just 0.2pc month-on-month, and the average UK house price is now £218,000.

Despite the slight increase in growth Hansen Lu, an analyst at Capital Economics, said that the market “is still losing momentum”. He said: “With house prices very high and some buyers still cautious following the Brexit vote, we expect the slowdown to be extended well into next year.”

He added that affordability is stretched, and potential homebuyers’ “ability to borrow more to bid up home prices is becoming increasingly constrained”.

Howard Archer, an analyst at IHS Global Insight, said that home prices look likely to rise modestly in the near term, but will slow down at the end of next year to around 2pc.

He added: “We believe the fundamentals for home buyers will progressively deteriorate during 2017 with consumers’ purchasing power weakening markedly and the labour market likely softening.”

He said that the low supply of homes for sale, as reported by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, means that any softening in house prices would be limited.

House prices picked up pace in November and will keep rising in the months ahead, but a slowdown in activity next year will hurt the economy, according to the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics).

Looking ahead, 14 per cent expected prices to increase in the next three months, while 40 per cent predicted rises over the next year, “except in London, where the long-term outlook is much weaker”.

These figures tie in with a Halifax report this week showing annual house price increases picking up pace last month and a Reuters [2] poll of experts by Reuters that predicted growth of two per cent next year.

See properties for sale from Elite Estates

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Asking prices fell 1.1pc in November, according to the online property portal Rightmove, which described the market as “resilient”. It said that this was a smaller drop than the average 1.8pc fall at this time of year.

In the last 12 months the average asking price has increased by 4.5pc. But behind the headline figure, price rises were highest for first-time buyers, who typically are looking for homes with two or fewer bedrooms.

The average asking price of these homes grew by 8.2pc in the last 12 months, higher than those for ‘second-steppers’, where that growth was 5.4pc. On a monthly basis, this was the only type of home which had prices rises. This comes after members of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors reported very low levels of new property listed on the market.

Rightmove also reported that the north-east of England was the only area in the country where asking prices have increased in the last month, by just 0.1pc. In south-east England they fell by 2pc between October and November. The highest annual growth rate is in the east of England, at 5.8pc, followed by the South-west, at 5.7pc.

The number of homes sold in October is 18.8pc lower than in the same month last year, according to the estate agency haart. Its housing market monitor also found that buyer demand and the number of homes coming on to the market fell last month as well. There are nine buyers for every new property that comes onto the market in the UK.

Meanwhile, new data from Homelet revealed rental growth has slowed for the fourth month in a row. The annual growth rate of new rents is now 3pc.

Martin Totty, chief executive of Homelet, said: “We know wage growth has lagged rental price inflation and it could be that we are approaching an affordability ceiling whereby landlords can’t attract tenants able to afford higher rents.

“It’s also a fact the average duration of a tenancy is increasing and our data suggests this has now increased to twenty-eight months on average: that might suggest landlords are valuing the security of a reliable tenant and accommodating their wish to remain in the property for longer.”

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Rightmove surveyed over 3,000 consumers as part of our Market Intelligence campaign, quizzing respondents on when they knew the property they own was the right home for them.

29% admitted they made up their minds either when they first arrived, or when they first set foot in the door
8% stated they decided after seeing the property online
4% after seeing the property advertised in a newspaper
41% of home-owners decided to buy the house they live in before getting past the hallway
Similar results were seen for those currently renting:
42% of tenants made up their minds before going past the hallway.

Rightmove director Miles Shipside comments:
“It’s strange to think that one of life’s most important purchasing decisions can be made before going past the hallway. Nothing stirs the emotions of the British public quite like home-hunting and many buyers already have a picture in their heads of their ‘dream home’ as they begin the property search process. When a property ticks all the right boxes straight away, many buyers can make quick, emotionally-led decisions. A further third of buyers made their decision to purchase at some stage during the first viewing, so stirring those initial emotions is vital but it is important to cover all bases and deliver a good all-round property-viewing experience.”

The results of Rightmove’s survey may concern sellers about how to make the right first impression and capture those 2 in 5 home-buyers who make impulsive, emotionally-led decisions based on early information, as well as capture the imagination of the 1 in 3 who decide during the first viewing. To help, Rightmove is launching a major new consumer campaign called Market Intelligence, aimed at providing vendors and landlords with tips and market data on how to sell and let their property this summer.

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Britain’s housing totalling 28.6 million homes grew in value by nearly £1.4 billion per day during 2015, says Zoopla research. Brentford and West Drayton are areas with largest increases in 2015 (24% and 17% respectively). Wales is the region with the lowest price gains over the past 12 months, at 2.2%. Edinburgh, Bristol and Glasgow amongst top online property searches in 2015.

Zoopla says that the country’s 28.6 million homes are now worth a combined £7.76 trillion (£7,764,650,690,201) — with the total residential stock value rising £519 billion (7.2%) over the past year.

The average British property is now worth £290,827 and has risen in value by more than £20,000 (7.4%) on average in 2015 – marking a bigger increase year-on-year than 2014 (6.9%).

Homeowners in London have seen the highest housing price growth in 2015 of any region, with an 11.8% annual uplift. The East of England follows closely with an 11.6% rise – up from 9.6% during 2014. However, property owners in Wales and Scotland saw the lowest growth in house prices in the last 12 months, with values rising just 2.2% and 2.7% respectively.

Bodacious Brentford
Brentford in Middlesex, Greater London finished the year with the greatest increase in housing prices, with values increasing by nearly 24% in 2015. Nearby West Drayton, along with Thame in Oxfordshire also experienced strong growth over the past 12 months, with both localities adding 17% on average to their house prices to round out the top three towns.

London, Edinburgh, and Bristol were the top three most searched-for locations by British house-hunters on Zoopla in 2015. Northern areas also performed well, with Glasgow rising in the rankings – moving from sixth place in 2014 to fourth place this year – while Leeds broke into the top 10, coming in eighth.

Zoopla also revealed what crucial criteria house-hunters using the property portal have been searching for in 2015. Amongst the most popular keyword searches over the past year were ‘bungalow’, ‘cottage’ and ‘village’, with aspirational property perusers also searching for homes offering a ‘pool’ and a ‘sea view.’

Lawrence Hall (left) of Zoopla, said, “Whilst the property market typically slows at this time of the year, prices have performed well in 2015, with some standout towns such as Brentford faring particularly well. Regions like East Anglia continue to boom as professionals and families seek out properties beyond the London commuter belt. Even regions like Wales, where growth has typically been very incremental, have totalled respectable annual growth rates. Of course, to every silver lining there must be a cloud and the price rises we’re seeing do make it harder for those looking to take their first step onto the ladder. But with Government Help to Buy schemes still in place and the promise of new homes to ease demand both buyers and sellers should have at least some reason to be upbeat as we go into 2016

Executive Durham Homes from Elite Estates

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Direct commissioning has not been used on this scale since Margaret Thatcher started the regeneration of Docklands, the benefit is that it allows the government to assume responsibility for developing land, instead of large building firms.

Prime Minister David Cameron said it was a “huge shift in government policy. Nothing like this has been done on this scale in three decades, government rolling its sleeves up and getting homes built.”

The Labour party said he was using “rhetoric to hide his failure on new homes.” Shadow Housing Minister John Healey said the announcement did not promise new investment or affordable homes beyond those already announced.

‘Radical’ shift
Adding to Mr Cameron’s energy rush, Communities Secretary Greg Clark (left) said that the government was not only rolling up its sleeves but was “pulling out all the stops to get the country building.”
“We know that consistently 90% of people aspire to own their own home, and for many years now home ownership has been in decline,” he said.
He added that the eight biggest building firms accounted for 50% of the house-building market, and there was a need to involve smaller and medium-sized companies.

Homes for all
Downing Street said the move marked a “radical new policy shift”, with up to 13,000 homes set to be built on five publicly-owned sites in 2016 – with up to 40% being affordable “starter” homes.
The government wants to build 200,000 starter homes – to be offered to first-time buyers under 40 at a minimum 20% discount price – by 2020.
The discounts apply to properties worth up to £250,000 outside London, or £450,000 in the capital.

Where will they build?
A pilot for the scheme will start on five sites:
LONDON: Brownfield land at Old Oak Common, in north-west London
KENT: Former Connaught Barracks, in Dover
CAMBRIDGESHIRE: Ex-MoD land at Northstowe, in Cambridgeshire
SUSSEX: Former hospital site at Lower Graylingwell, in Chichester
HAMPSHIRE: MoD site at Daedelus Waterfront, in Gosport

Richard Donnell, Director of Research at Hometrack said, “One of the greatest challenges to growing housing supply has been the loss of capacity from small builders whose numbers have halved between 2007 and 2013. Only 2,710 are estimated to have been building in the last year. The barriers to small builders developing homes have risen with planning and finance risks limiting access to the market.”

“The Government needs as many types of builder as possible to meet its target to grow supply. While the number of homes announced today is relatively small it sends the message that smaller builders have an important role to play if we are to grow housing volumes.”

Rhian Kelly, CBI Business Environment Director, said, “This announcement by the Prime Minister, if successfully rolled out across the country, should be a real spur to our ability to build more homes.

“To move us closer to the 240,000 homes we need built each year, the Government must ensure we have a healthy and vibrant housing market, with a mix of tenures, including the Private Rental Sector, affordable and social homes to rent and buy, and home ownership.”

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From Monday 1^st February 2016 it became compulsory for all private landlords in England to check that new tenants have the right to be in the UK before renting out their property.

Under the new rules, landlords, including those who sub-let or take in lodgers, who fail to check a potential tenant’s ‘Right to Rent’ will face penalties of up to £3,000 per tenant.

But Right to Rent, which was introduced in the Immigration Act 2014 as part of the Government’s reforms ‘to build a fairer and more effective immigration system’, has been criticised after it was revealed that most landlords are still not prepared for the new legislation.

“There has been an influx of new legislation relating to the rental market made in recent years and we know that UK landlords are struggling to keep on top of these changes. Despite knowing many of the basics, many find it difficult to navigate the minefield of changing renting rights and wrongs and this is particularly so for accidental landlords,” said Adam Male (left), Co-Founder, Urban.

A new survey from the Residential Landlords Association (RLA) reveals that 90 per cent of landlords have received no information from the Government about the new Right to Rent scheme, the first phase of which was launched in parts of the West Midlands in December, while almost three quarters of the 1,500 landlords surveyed did not know what the rules obliged them to do.

“Outsourcing border patrol to landlords is like asking passengers to drive trains – a foolish and senseless example of delegation,” said Matt Hutchinson, Director of flatshare site, SpareRoom.co.uk.

Hutchinson (above) believes that many landlords may now seek to avoid the risk altogether by simply letting to people with UK passports.

He added, “This could lead to cut and dry examples of discrimination as landlords look for ways to simplify the vetting process – which also requires follow up checks – by reconsidering who they are inclined to let to.”

Despite the opposition, Immigration Minister James Brokenshire insists that Right to Rent checks are “quick and simple” and many responsible landlords already do them as a matter of routine.

He commented, “Right to Rent is about deterring those who are illegally resident from remaining in the UK. Those with a legitimate right to be here will be able to prove this easily and will not be adversely affected.

“Under Right to Rent, landlords should check identity documents for all new tenants and take copies. The scheme has been designed to make it straightforward for people to give evidence of their right to rent and a range of commonly available documents can be used.”

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In July, markets believed a rate rise would happen within six months. But then the Black Monday crash in August undermined confidence. This was followed by the decision in late September not to increase rates in the US.
The UK economy is also looking less rosy than a money ago. Consumer confidence has fallen, unemployment has risen and the latest figures show slowing GDP. Deflation is also likely to return again in coming months. The counter to all of this is that pay settlements are on the rise. The monetary policy committee voted 8-1 to keep rates on hold at the October meeting (8 Oct).
Vicky Redwood of Capital Economics said: “The MPC’s decision to keep interest rates unchanged would have been an easy one given the recent softening in both domestic and global economic news. While financial markets have probably gone too far in pushing back expectations of the first rate hike until the start of next year (see the chart below), they have the gist of it right: the MPC is in no rush to raise rates.
“There are good reasons for the majority of the committee to vote to keep rates on hold until well into next year. For a start, the next set of inflation figures (of which the MPC will have seen a preview) should show that inflation dropped back into negative territory in September. While this deflation should only last a couple of months, the MPC will want to be sure that no second-round effects on inflation expectations are taking hold before tightening policy. And further ahead, a pick-up in productivity growth should keep unit wage costs and inflation under control.
“Meanwhile, the US Fed is not now expected to raise interest rates until next year – and we have explained before why there across the Atlantic… Finally, the minutes showed that some members ‘noted recent evidence that lags in the response of inflation to interest rate changes appeared a bit shorter than previously thought’.”

“This might indicate that rates can be left on hold a bit longer than they might have been in the past. Overall, a rate rise before the second quarter still seems unlikely in our view and, while not our central forecast, it is easy to imagine rates not rising until the second half of next year.”
It should also be noted that Bank of England chief economist Andy Haldane, arch dove of the monetary policy committee, last month said the case for UK raising interest rates is “some way from being made” and that negative rates may still be needed.

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