November 2017 Property Market factfile

A round up of the latest property market news, collating survey data, statistics, trends and information about the property market. (All figures below are the most recently available data.)

UK House Price Index
Data source: Land Registry
UK average house price = £226,367,  up 0.4% in the month, up 5.4% in the year.
Monthly index (where January 2015 = 100) is 118.7

Supply and demand is broadly in balance across the market. The Help to Buy scheme has been crucial for first time buyers. Regionally, the North West is the region with the highest growth, at 7.3% annually, and the slowest growth was in London, at 2.5%.

Halifax
UK average house price = £225,826, up 0.3% in the month, up 2.3% in the quarter, up 4.5% in the year.

House prices are continuing to rise and are growing at their fastest rate since January. The average prices is the highest on record.

The recent base rate rise is unlikely to affect house buying, although mortgage approvals, new sales instructions and house buyer enquiries all fell in September.

The Halifax’s ‘confidence tracker’ showed that deposits and job security remain the biggest concern of borrowers, although only a third were concerned about base rate increases.

Rightmove
England and Wales average house asking price = £311,043 down -0.8% in the month and up 1.8% in the year

Nationally, 37% of properties on the market have reduced their original sale price. This is normal for the run up to Christmas, although it is the smallest fall in the last ten years. Sellers who have reduced their prices more than once have reduced by an average 6.3%. Successful sales are being achieved at an average 6.3% reduction, indicating that in many cases sellers were over-optimistic in their original asking price.

In London, 43% of sellers have reduced their asking price by an average 6.7%.

Nationwide
UK average house price = £210,116 up 0.2% in the month, up 2.0% in the year

[November’s update not yet available]

LSL / Acadata
Average England and Wales house price = £298,438, 0.0% from last month, up 0.8% in the year.

Excluding London and the South East of England, average house prices have risen by 2.8% in the year. Overall, the increase has been 0.8%.

The rate of growth is at its slowest since March 2012 and at the same level as November 2016.

London prices are continuing to decline, particularly at the more expensive end. Eleven of the 33 boroughs are down -5.6% in the year, although the lower third showed modest growth of 1%.

The number of house sale transactions is 1% lower than the same period last year. Sales of detached and semi-detached houses have increased by 8% and 9% respectively, while the number of flats sold has declined by -1%.

HM Revenue & Customs
The provisional number of UK residential property transaction completions (>£40k) for October 2017 was 105,260, representing an increase of 1.7% between Sept-Oct 2017, and the seasonally adjusted figure is 9.2% higher than October 2016. The number of non-adjusted residential transactions was 1.1% higher than September 2017, and 13.3% higher than October 2016.

The number of non-residential property transactions increased by 12.1% between Sept-Oct 2017. This is 9.6% higher than October 2016.

Countrywide, the UK’s largest estate agency group in the UK, has published its Monthly Lettings Index for October 2017. It reported that 65% of purchases by landlords over the last year have been made by cash buyers, including 78% of buyers in the North East and 42% in London. Rents increased by an average 0.5% in the year.

This record number of cash buyers have spent £21 billion on homes in the last year, and much of the cash has come from landlords remortgaging existing properties to take equity from homes already in their ownership. The figure is £0.2 billion higher than 2016 and 32% higher than 2007.

Land Registry Price Paid Data
Of the 97,102 residential sales received for registration in September, the most expensive residential property sale was a flat in the City of Westminster, which sold for £15,200,000. There were 568 residential property sales valued at £1m or more in England and Wales, 320 of which were in London.

The cheapest residential sale was a semi-detached property in Birmingham, West Midlands, which sold for £17,500.

REGIONAL HOUSE PRICES

UK HPI Regional figures (all percentages are positive unless indicated otherwise)
September 2017 (published 14 Nov 2017) Average price (£)
GBP
Monthly change
%
Annual change
%
England £243,945 0.6% 5.7%
Northern Ireland (Quarter 1 – 2017) £132,169 3.0% 6.0%
Scotland £144,924 -1.3% 3.1%
Wales £152,661 0.6% 5.3%
East Midlands £184,399 0.7% 6.4%
East of England £289,301 0.3% 5.9%
London £483,568 -0.2% 2.5%
North East £130,271 0.5% 4.4%
North West £160,951 2.1% 7.3%
South East £324,465 0.3% 5.5%
South West £252,737 0.5% 6.6%
West Midlands Region £189,038 0.4% 5.7%
Yorkshire and The Humber £158,884 1.0% 5.6%

UK HPI Average monthly price by property type

Property type September 2017 September 2016 Difference
Detached £341,941 £323,250 5.8%
Semi-detached £212,477 £201,442 5.5%
Terraced £183,685 £174,173 5.5%
Flat or maisonette £203,388 £194,350 4.7%
All £226,367 £214,816 5.4%

 

Rightmove regional figures
November 2017 Average price (£)
GBP
Monthly change
%
Annual change
%
Greater London 628,219 -0.2 -2.4
South East 410,810 -1.1 2.2
South West 306,645 -0.7 3.8
East of England 346,106 -1.3 3.6
West Midlands 216,665 -1.4 5.1
East Midlands 206,734 -0.5 5.5
Wales 182,939 -0.5 4.5
North West 185,445 -0.8 3.5
Yorkshire & Humberside 180,766 0.6 3.8
North East 144,186 -5.0 -0.4

 

FOCUS ON LONDON Average Price (£)

GBP

Monthly change

%

Annual change

%

Best and Worst (-) performers according to:
Rightmove November 2017
Redbridge 475,636 -2.3 4.4
Bexley 372,201 -2.1 3.7
Tower Hamlets 560,318 -6.2 -10.0
Islington 747,629 -5.7 -13.0
LCL Acadata September 2017 (published Nov 2017)
Redbridge 474,979 2.3 10.6
Bexley 367,986 0.3 6.8
Hammersmith & Fulham 852,009 -3.9 -12.8
City of Westminster 1,349,773 -1.2 -19.2

RICS Survey Overview

The RICS Residential Market Survey for October 2017 reported subdued demand and sales in nearly all areas. This trend is expected to continue at least for the next three months.

Prices in London and the South East continue to fall, and East Anglia and the North East also recorded negative prices. The North West, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland all showed house price gains.

Nationally, asking prices for homes on the market are not being met in full. The variation of sale price to asking price is greater on more expensive homes. 70% of homes valued at over £1m are not achieving the full asking price, compared to 62% of homes for sale between £0.5m and £1m, and 42% of homes for sale for under £0.5m.

Tenant demand is largely unchanged over the last three months but new landlord instructions have declined. Over the next five years, rents are anticipated to rise by 3.5% per annum. Price growth over the same period is expected to be 1% per annum. London is the only area where rental growth projections are negative.

Source: Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors

 

Rightmove.co.uk is the UK’s leading property website, displaying details of homes for sale or rent to the largest online audience. It is consistently ranked the number one property website in the UK (source: Experian Hitwise). It has around 90% of all properties for sale and at any time displays a stock of over one million properties to buy or rent, worth around £270 billion. The Rightmove.co.uk site attracts over 130 million visits from home movers each month with time on site averaging over one billion minutes per month (Rightmove data, 2017).

LSL Acad E&W HPI is derived from Land Registry (LR) house price data, seasonally and mix adjusted by property type. © Crown copyright material reproduced with the permission of Land Registry. The prices are smoothed to show underlying trends. LSL Acad E&W HPI includes cash purchase prices and is the only index based upon the complete, factual house price data for England & Wales, as opposed to a sample.

UK HPI: Monthly house price inflation, calculated using data from Land Registry, Registers of Scotland and Land and Property Services Northern Ireland. This replaces the previous House Price Indices separately published by Office of National Statistics and Land Registry.

All figures within this article are correct at the time of going to press, and are reproduced in good faith. No responsibility will be taken for any decisions taken based on the information contained herein. Always seek professional advice.

Next Monthly Market Fact File due in December 2017.

PropertySurveying.co.uk