Docklands News

HMRC figures reveals that UK house sales fell by 3% month-on-month in December. Analysis shows an estimated 101,920 homes were sold in December 2022, which was 1% higher than in December 2021 but 3% lower than in November 2022. During the same period year earlier, 1,049,450 house sales had taken place. The HMRC’s report said house sales had generally been stable in recent months but were slightly weaker in December. It added: “The impact of higher mortgages rates is only beginning to appear now because transactions data is based upon date of completion, and it typically takes between two to four months for a house sale to complete. Many buyers are still looking to proceed with their purchase in order to take advantage of pre-agreed mortgages with lower rates. The levels of current monthly property transactions are higher than late 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic.” 

Daily Mail (24/01/2023)   The Independent (24/01/2023)  

New data reveals that the number of buyers pulling out of property sales and collapsed chains has increased sharply over the past three months. Analysis by TwentyCi, a property data company, found that the share of agreed sales collapsing before completion jumped to a high of 25.4% in November, up from 23% in October and 21% in September. This compares with a rate of 22% in November 2021, and 23% in the same month in 2019. In the week after the mini-Budget, the number of housing sales that fell through rose to around 7,900, from 5,890 previously, and then increased to 8,500 in each of the following two weeks. 

The Daily Telegraph (23/01/2023)  

The gap in life expectancy between the richest and poorest areas of London has increased as house prices rise. Imperial College London tracked changes in life expectancy in thousands of areas between 2002 and 2019 and analysed these alongside data from the Land Registry. The study found that large gains in life expectancy occurred where house prices were already high, or in areas where house prices grew the most. But life expectancy inequality — the difference between the highest and lowest percentiles of the areas — increased substantially. The study said that areas where house prices grew the most saw an influx of “new, more educated and better-off” working age residents during the period. These areas also saw an “outflux of residents in retirement ages” as well as children, adolescents and young adults.

Evening Standard (20/01/2023)  

Developer Lendlease has submitted a hybrid planning application covering a near-50-acre site at the Royal Docks in Silvertown. The scheme would create around 6,500 homes, 50% of them affordable; it would also include refurbishing the long-derelict Millennium Mills building, where more than 780,000 sq ft of "next generation work and creative spaces’ would be created alongside a surrounding ‘employment quarter". Lendlease says the development would “embrace its dockside location” and benefit from the Custom House station on the Elizabeth Line. The developers said they will create one of the greenest new neighbourhoods in London, with all homes and commercial spaces supplied with hot water and heating through a zero-carbon district heating system.

Property Week (18/01/2023)  

London homebuyers have historically paid a premium to be near the a train station, but new figures show that the further away a home is from a train station, the faster its price is growing. In 2019, once 600m from a station the average price would start to fall. However, three years and a pandemic later prices for London homes further away from stations have grown so much that they are catching up with those for better connected properties. However, buyers in the home counties still pay more for bigger properties further from a train station, but homeowners who live near a station have seen their house prices increase the most since the pandemic. Much of this uplift can be attributed to Londoners moving out of the capital but still wanting a connection into the city.  

The Sunday Times (15/01/2023)  

Office for National Statistics data showed on Wednesday that UK house prices fell 0.3% between October and November, their first monthly fall in more than one year. This brought the annual growth rate to 10.3% in November, down from 12.4% in the previous month. The average UK house price was £295,000, slightly down on October’s record high of £296,000. Average house prices increased 10.9% over the year to £315,000 in England, 10.7% to £220,000 in Wales, 5.5% to £191,000 in Scotland and 10.7% to £176,000 in Northern Ireland. Prices fell most sharply in regions where they had risen the most over the course of the pandemic. For example, average prices in northeast England fell by 2.6%. At £163,000, the northeast also continued to be the location of the lowest average house price in England. London remains by the most expensive place to buy a house, with the average home worth £542,000 in November. That is only 6.3% more than the average value a year before, the lowest rate of annual inflation of any region. 

City AM (18/01/2023)   Daily Mail (18/01/2023)   Financial Times (18/01/2023)   The Times (18/01/2023)