The Welsh version of Help To Buy has been given a boost by the announcement that participating housebuilders no longer have to hold a consumer credit licence.
Until now, builders had to hold a specific consumer credit Type C Credit Brokerage licence; even if the builder was part of a larger parent company with that licence, the builder had to obtain its own separate licence.
This had to be obtained, and shown to the Welsh government, before the builder could advertise any of its units as being available under the Welsh Help To Buy system.
But the cost and delay involved in obtaining that licence has become a "significant deterrent" to the success of Help To Buy in the principality according to a Welsh government spokesman. So the requirement has now been scrapped.
Figures produced by the UK Treasury six weeks ago - the latest data available - show that only 369 homes in Wales have been sold under the Help To Buy mortgage guarantee scheme. This is the equivalent of only five per cent of the HTB completions across the UK.
First-time buyers accounted for most of the sales in Wales - a total of 309. The average value of Welsh properties bought under this guarantee scheme is about £114,800 while the average value of all homes across Wales is just below £164,000.
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Comments
It's fairly new so obviously there are going to be hiccups at first. It's good that they're noticing them and dealing with it accordingly. I think to compare to the UK is a bit silly due to the different level of funding and amount of available homes etc.
"369 homes in Wales have been sold under the Help To Buy mortgage guarantee scheme" - doesn't make for great reading, does it I'm still very dubious about the merits of this scheme, I think the cons outweigh the pros quite considerably.