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Rental home loan deposit scheme for certain employees in UK widened
The UK government has announced wide support for a new rental deposit loan scheme that will become available to thousands of potential tenants. Housing Minister Brandon Lewis said that the aim is to create a bigger, better private rented sector through a scheme that offers deposit loans to Whitehall staff looking to take up new tenancies in the private rented sector. The scheme, which works in the same way as a staff season ticket loan, will allow employees to borrow some of their salary upfront in order to pay for rental deposits, which is then repayable from salary payments over up to a year. It is available to be taken up in both the public and private sectors. The Department for Communities and Local Government last October became the first government department to roll the scheme out to its staff, with ministers pushing other parts of government and the public sector to follow suit. The department is working with the Department for Business Innovation and Skills to increase availability across the private sector. ‘This move will mean thousands of people will be offered a helping hand to rent privately through season ticket style loans from their employers. I hope to see more employers in the public and private sector joining the scheme in the near future,’ said Lewis. The scheme was created by the homelessness charity Shelter and the Greater London Authority was another public body to introduce the scheme for its staff. The tenancy deposit scheme can be adapted by different employers to suit their needs, but generally employees are offered interest free loans to pay their deposits when they move into a privately rented home, which are then paid back through their salary over the course of up to a year. Continue reading
Latest quarterly figures show house prices up 3.4% in Scotland
House prices continued to rise in Scotland in the fourth quarter of last year taking them to their highest level since current records began in 2003. The data from the Registers of Scotland shows that the average house price in Scotland was £165,197, an increase 3.4% on the same period in 2013. The figures also show that the total value of sales across Scotland was up by 3.1% compared to the previous year to just under £4.2 billion. Moray showed the highest percentage rise, with the value of sales increasing by 21.7% year on year. Edinburgh remained the largest market with sales of just over £656 million, an increase of 2.8%. North Ayrshire recorded the highest percentage rise in average price compared with the same quarter of the previous year, up 17.1% to £124,260. Aberdeenshire had the highest average at £232,331, a rise of 5% while the largest percentage fall in price was in Falkirk, which showed a drop of 4.3% with an average price of £123,180. However, the total volume of sales across Scotland fell by 0.3%, the first decrease in sales volumes since 2012. Argyll and Bute showed the largest percentage rise in the number of sales with an increase of 18.2% and Edinburgh again recorded the highest sales volume but this was down 1.5% on the previous year. The largest percentage decrease was in Stirling, which showed a drop of 14.2%. All property types, with the exception of detached properties, showed an increase in average house price in this quarter, the biggest being in semi-detached properties at 5.5%. With the exception of flats, all property types experienced a decrease in sales volumes, with detached properties recording the biggest decrease of 4.2% compared to the previous year. Property consultancy, CKD Galbraith, said it saw a steady growth in sales throughout 2014 which is continuing into 2015. There was also a 23% increase in the number of viewings against 2013’s figures for the same period. ‘Prices achieved for all properties sold by the firm during 2014 were on average 1.54% over the asking price. The past three months have proved to be busy and productive with buyers hesitancy around the referendum period translating into a surge of activity and successful transactions during the final quarter of the year,’ said Simon Brown, partner and head of residential sales at CKD Galbraith. ‘The momentum has continued throughout January and we expect there to be more movement at the higher end of the market before the stamp duty changes occur in April. Although the general election is likely to cause a slight slowdown in activity, we can say that 2015 looks set to be a promising year for the property sector,’ he added. Scotland’s property market can continue to take confidence from these latest results, according to Peter Grant, chief executive officer of Grant Property. ‘It’s notable that total volume of sales continues to be up and this is reflected by our own business activity,’ he… Continue reading
Economic performance drives UK property markets, not elections
The upcoming general election in the UK has so far had a minimal impact on the country’s property markets as the economy is the more significant driver, it is claimed. Periods of strong economic growth coincide with strong office take-up and the correlation between property related decisions and timing of general elections is negligible, according to a new report by commercial property and real estate services advisor CBRE. ‘Conventional wisdom suggests that property markets slow as a general election approaches. Elections are uncertain, with the forthcoming election more uncertain than most,’ said Miles Gibson, head of UK research at CBRE. ‘However, the data shows that the property market is actually very resilient in the run-up to an election, with little observable change to the overall behaviour of the market, except where a detailed policy has already been proposed, such as the mansion tax,’ he explained. ‘There is little, if any, evidence of UK general elections having any overall impact on property investors or occupiers, the pace of planning decisions, or house prices. This may be because Party manifesto policies on property are typically very general and, where they are specific, they take time to be implemented,’ he added. Using data from the past 30 years, the report says there is little evidence to suggest that general elections cause a slowdown in the central London office investment market. In the last 30 years, there have been six general elections, all of which took place in the second quarter of the year. Second quarters tend to be quieter than the quarterly average. This holds true for non-general election years as well as general election years. However, there were year on year increases in investment transactions observed in five out of the six general election quarters in the period suggesting that the traditional weakness of second quarters is due to seasonal factors unrelated to the occurrence of general elections. The report points out that the central London investment market is very strong at present. With latent demand undoubtedly robust, the strength of the market in the first half of 2015 will be driven by the availability of stock rather than the election outcome. As evidence, it says that commercial occupiers in central London seem undeterred by the forthcoming general election as evidenced by the 15 million square feet leased during 2014, the highest annual total since 2006. It also says that against a backdrop of robust economic and strong office based employment growth, demand for office space will not diminish because of an impending election. This is already reflected in an above average level of space under offer and a high level of active requirements, suggesting that 2015 will be yet another good year for leasing activity. The report also argues that there is no discernible negative impact at a national level in the residential sector on either the mortgage market… Continue reading
