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HMRC figures show that the 3% stamp duty surcharge on additional properties, introduced in 2016, had raised £6.6bn by the end of last year. The Treasury originally put the target at £2.9bn by the end of the 2019/2020 tax year. When it was launched, George Osborne, the Chancellor at the time, said it would help first time buyers by dampening the investor market, but analysis by Countrywide of the charge's first year found that only 69% of those affected were landlords and second home-buyers. Tax expert Adam Kay said: “The whole point of this was to stop people buying too much property - many cases have nothing to do with that. It is reasonable to argue that it isn't working.”
The Times (06/03/2020)
The Telegraph looks at what the coronavirus outbreak means for the London prime property market. It notes that the share of Chinese buyers in prime central London (PCL) has just hit an all-time high, accounting for 6% of all PCL sales in the last six months of 2019. “When it comes to Chinese and other Asian investment in UK property, the coronavirus outbreak is definitely a disrupter,” says Georg Chmiel of Juwai IQI, a company that helps Chinese buyers invest abroad. The group most vulnerable to a depressed Chinese market are developers, which typically market their projects off-plan. However, there is also a flipside: Coronavirus is bringing a spike in internet shopping, and interest from Chinese buyers on certain schemes, particularly those in the City, east and west London, is “up 50 to 60%,” since the outbreak began.
The Daily Telegraph (04/03/2020)
UK house prices rose at the fastest annual rate for 18 months in February after December’s decisive election buoyed the market, according to Nationwide. The 2.3% annual increase is the best since July 2018, bolstering evidence of a “Boris bounce”. Nationwide's chief economist Robert Gardner said the landslide Tory victory may have pushed buyers back into the market. However, the outlook for house prices will depend on the UK’s economic performance over the coming months, which could take a hit depending on the outcome of Brexit trade talks and the impact of the coronavirus outbreak. “There are still significant uncertainties that threaten to exert a drag on the economy in the coming quarters,” Mr Gardner warned.
The Daily Telegraph (28/02/2020) The Guardian (28/02/2020) The Times (28/02/2020)
Families are taking on huge mortgages in a bid to climb off the first rung of the property ladder and move to a bigger home, according to the Financial Conduct Authority. The number of borrowers taking out mammoth loans that stretch to more than six and a half times their income has soared, the City regulator said. It added that most of these borrowers are home-movers rather than first-time buyers. More than 96,000 mortgages taken out last year were for more than four and a half times the borrower's income, and 4,594 mortgages were for more than six and a half times income.
The Times (28/02/2020)
UK banks approved 70,900 mortgages in January, according to the Bank of England, up 4.4% from December’s 67,930 figure to the highest number in four years. Remortgaging approvals were also up by 3.9%, to around 52,100. Samuel Tombs, chief UK economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said: “As a result, we now think that the Bank of England will cut bank rates to 0.5% this month, from 0.75%. The recovery in approvals likely has further to run.”
The Daily Telegraph (02/03/2020)
The number of house sales rose 5.2% in a year, with 102,810 transactions completed in January – a 4.1% jump between December and January, according to the latest figures from HMRC. The data also show an increase in transactions of non-residential properties, with some 11,170 commercial properties sold in January, 10.7% higher than in January last year – the highest volume of commercial property sales and the biggest monthly rise in almost 12 years.HMRC pointed out that January's figures reflect sales agreed in September and October, and Jeremy Leaf, a former RICS residential chairman said “if the [numbers] are like this now, they are set to be even stronger as we approach the peak spring-buying season.”
Daily Mail (21/02/2020)