Market boom partly down to richest house movers

A new analysis off the housing market suggests that the current frenzy is down partly to activity in the most expensive sector.

Property and data insight consultancy TwentyCi says homes priced above £750,000 have experienced an 83 per cent growth rate since Q2 2019. 

Relative growth in the lowest priced bracket for properties up to £150,000 has been much slower than average, with growth rates since 2019 struggling at four per cent.  

In the final week of the ‘main’ stamp duty holiday - at the £500,000 threshold - there were over 78,000 property completions, four times the usual volume. 

However, for anyone agreeing to sell their property before March 31 2021 nearly 124,000 were unable to complete in time for the deadline. 

TwentyCi, in its latest market snapshot, also says that there’s  an acute lack of stock

Aside from London the whole of England and Wales at a regional level has between 2.0 and 1.7 months of property stock left to sell. Overall, the available months of stock numbers are down by half on historical norms. 

The South West has the lowest level of houses for sale, whilst Inner London currently has the most. 

Despite the stamp duty holiday at the £500,000 threshold coming to an end and the £250,000 threshold finishing in September, the number of people wanting to move has risen by 11 per cent since last quarter now accounting for 428,567 households, indicating that it is unlikely the property market will slow down significantly this year. 

Compared to Q2 2019 the number of households in the moving journey is up by over 40 per cent, with an additional 500,000 households entering, progressing or completing the process of moving. 

In comparison to Q2 2019 new instructions have fallen by four per cent, whilst the number of sales agreed have risen by 33 per cent and exchanges have increased by 18 per cent. 

Sales agreed across the whole of the UK are on average 33 per cent greater than in Q2 2019. The North East has experienced the highest growth at 45 per cent, whilst Scotland has seen the lowest growth at 13 per cent.  

Colin Bradshaw, TwentyCi’s chief customer officer, says: “As we adjust to a society tasked with living with Covid-19 we await the true impact of the pandemic and whether significant volume and momentum that has occurred within the residential property sector, fuelled by generous fiscal policy and a significant change in consumer preferences will sharply recalibrate to pre-2020 levels.”