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Written by rosalind renshaw

The surge of first-time buyers in March before the end of the Stamp Duty holiday is now having a significant impact on agents’ business pipelines.

The warning has come from a conveyancing firm, while separately, one surveyors’ firm has warned that lending to first-time buyers has fallen sharply and another that overall valuation activity plunged by a third in April.

Conveyancing Alliance Group said that many chains were pushed to complete before the end of the Stamp Duty holiday. 

It says this has meant that business which normally would have completed in April and May is already off the books, with the result that levels of activity have been lower since the start of quarter two.
 
Conveyancing Alliance’s own figures show completion numbers down by a third from March to April.

Its figures also show that Easter 2012 was different to most years. Normal activity would see a rush to complete pre-Easter in order to move into new homes during the holiday period, but it says this did not materialise because this type of activity was undertaken earlier in March.
 
John Philips, sales director at Conveyancing Alliance, said: “The start of quarter two this year has been a lot different to previous years because of the artificial nature of the first-time buyer Stamp Duty holiday ending and the impact this has had on the marketplace. 

“Any chain pre-end of March with a first-time buyer involved would have been chasing an early completion date in order to make the most of the holiday. We have already seen much stronger transaction and mortgage lending figures for March than we might ordinarily expect to see because of this. 

“Unfortunately this does mean that pipeline business for the start of quarter two has fallen off; the impact for our own levels has been marked, with a discernible fall in completions and instructions since the end of March.” 

Meanwhile, e.surv chartered surveyors, part of LSL, said that mortgage approvals for first-time buyers fell to their lowest level for nine months in April, as banks clamped down further on lending.

The firm, which makes forecasts ahead of other data based on its own activity, predicts that approvals for first-time buyer loans fell to just 11,307 in April, 5% lower than in March and 1.2% down on April last year.

In the overall market, e-surv says that loans for house purchases fell to 49,165 in April, down 1.4% from March.

The third firm, Connells Survey & Valuation, said the total number of residential valuations conducted during April fell by 32% compared with March.

Comments

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    We went dead after 4 day bank holiday,then interest rate increase scare then double dip recession then another bank holiday.

    At least the govt. is helping.....not!!!

    • 11 May 2012 22:28 PM
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    I have been Little Doggies (AKA various things, in this case Very Good! Which is a brilliant dogs name) vet since he was found abandoned by his owner for being such an ugly little thing and since then he has struggled with being a loner but does have a wonderful sense of mischief and thinks he is the funniest little doggie ever to have cocked his leg up EAT.

    He loves running to and from articles, with his sloppy little tongue flapping about as he excitedly pants away waging his tail while doing a little piddle every now and then to leave his smell and show the big dogs how clever he is.

    I would be most grateful if you would humour him; life has been hard and continues to be in his lonely world so if you could give him a pat or maybe a treat of some kind I would be most grateful.

    One last thing, do be careful if you agree with him (or say anything he can misinterpreted as agreement) he will think you like him and hump you leg – we do hope to castrate him soon to try and kerb this.

    Many thanks

    • 11 May 2012 16:56 PM
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    Pill and Ocks then little Jonnie posts!

    • 11 May 2012 16:37 PM
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    Agree with Jonnie

    Going for a break myself at the end of this month

    • 11 May 2012 13:44 PM
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    @rant

    This is one of those articles we talked about the other day mate – the biggest conveyancer in the country has about 2.5% market share (max) and this little lot have a lot less than that, a fraction of 1%

    Would you pay any attention to a house price index based on the sale of say 8 of the 800,000 transactions last year, no, so don’t let this make you feel good, it’s based on such a small number its not worth it, it makes the RICS report / survey look comprehensive with 260 odd respondents.

    Anyway – what im hearing from my EA mates is the opposite. Pipelines are bigger than usual for this time of year because the bank holidays cock up the working week and every bugger seems to be clearing off for a short holiday whenever they can and the exchanges are being held up, plus any deal that didn’t benefit from the stamp duty got left in the fling cabinet and the focus was on the ones that had to be done by the 25th

    Be interesting to know what others think.

    Jonnie

    • 11 May 2012 13:12 PM
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    Yawn, same prittle prattle from the same folk, get a job!

    • 11 May 2012 11:14 AM
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    Fenton - I dont see a problem two stories are reporting what has happened and one is a forecast.

    • 11 May 2012 09:58 AM
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    You know, I hadn't noticed them bowing IN...

    You can't miss what you never had.

    Hey ho!

    • 11 May 2012 09:55 AM
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    "AGENTS PIPELINES HIT"

    "ONE THIRD OF BUYERS CUT ASKING PRICES"

    "HOUSE PRICES SET TO RISE NEXT YEAR"

    These are the first 3 headlines in the ea today this morning.

    SPOT THE ODD ONE OUT ???

    Really.....this goes to prove beyond doubt that industry commentators don't know what they are talking about.

    • 11 May 2012 09:38 AM
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    The next story says that less vendors have been cutting their asking prices since March. Clearly there are folk out there who thought the market momentum caused by the reimposition of the lower stamp duty was going to continue...

    • 11 May 2012 09:33 AM
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    "It says this has meant that business which normally would have completed in April and May is already off the books, with the result that levels of activity have been lower since the start of quarter two."

    ....And?

    So the equivalent of the same volume of business has been conducted across March, April and May anyway, but the agent got their fee for all of these work in March.

    This statement is either just stating the obvious, or completely stupid for thinking that volumes would maintain/increase March's level.

    Give me strength.

    :(

    • 11 May 2012 09:20 AM
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