Published: 05/03/2021
At BR Estate Agent, we stay in touch with what is happening locally, and we follow the latest studies and news in the housing market.
If you are looking to make the most informed decision regarding the housing market, we are here to help.
There has been a fall in the supply of homes
Information provided by Home.co.uk indicates less than three-quarters of new instructions materialised in January. This is a record low for the supply of property in England and Wales.
Even though the housing market has remained open during lockdown, buyers have been understandably cautious.
Drops in supply are evident in Wales, Scotland, and in all English regions apart from Greater London.
This isn’t a shock when you consider media coverage of the housing market in recent times. There has been a focus on people looking to leave London, and this is reflected in the number of people looking to leave the housing market.
However, Bromley is slightly different. While we have helped Bromley residents place their home on the market as they look to venture further from the capital, there is also interest in the local area.
Bromley offers the best of both worlds for many households, and it is easy to see why people from Inner London are considering Bromley as their next home.
A lack of homes for sale has long been a problem in the UK
It would be wrong to say that supply problems is a new issue in the UK housing market.
In August 2019, The UK Collaborative Centre for Housing Evidence published a guide called “Tackling the UK housing crisis: is supply the answer?”
It states, in its introduction; “In 2016 the House of Lords Select Committee on Economic Affairs report Building more homes argued that “[Too] few homes have been built over [recent decades]. House prices and rents in some parts of England have risen sharply.” The government’s 2017 housing white paper was even more stark: “The housing market in this country is broken, and the cause is very simple: for too long, we haven’t built enough homes.”
Then Communities Secretary, Sajid Javid, hammered the message home: “Soaring prices and rising rents caused by a shortage of the right homes in the right places has slammed the door of the housing market in the face of a whole generation.”
The need for more homes is evident in the UK.
Notable housing issues which have been linked to the lack of properties for sale are considered below.
Price rises have occurred in many parts of the UK including:
- Scotland, where a price hike of 1.6% has occurred in the past month
- Wales, where there has been a rise of 1.1% in house prices since last month
- The East of England, where property prices have risen by 0.5% in this time
The annualised mix-adjusted average price growth across England and Wales stands at +4.5%. By comparison, in February 2020, this growth was just 0.9%.
Year-on-year house price growth figures:
- Yorkshire and Humber regions have experienced growth of 9.1%
- Welsh property prices have grown by 8.4%, boosted by a surge in the most recent six months
- The South West has seen property prices rise by 3.3%
- Greater London and the South East have experienced a rise of 3.2%
If you are looking to make a move in the Bromley property market, and you would like to speak with local experts, please get in touch. If you would like to arrange a property valuation, contact us and we will set this up for you. You can phone your BR Estate Agent on 020 3633 8620 from 9am till 9pm seven days a week or visit our website www.br-estateagent.co.uk for more information.