First-time buyer sales up by 22 per cent last year
HOUSE sales to first-time buyers rose by 22 per cent last year with 326,500 taking their first steps onto the property ladder.
The rise in new buyers means sales at this end of the market are back to 2007 levels, at the start of the financial crisis.
The figures, published by lender Halifax, show that buyers were helped by lower deposit rates, better mortgage deals and government schemes like help to buy. Better wages are also likely to have had an effect, Halifax added.
It’s not all good news, however, with the 10 most expensive local authority areas for first-time buyers falling in the London area.
The most expensive is Camden, where the average first-time buyer’s property costs a whopping £614,315, 11.4 times the gross average annual earnings in the area.
“First-time buyers are vital for a properly functioning housing market. Improving economic conditions and rising employment levels have boosted confidence among those thinking about getting on to the housing ladder for the first time, contributing to the significant increase in the number of first-time buyers in the past two years,” said Craig McKinlay, mortgages director at Halifax.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the average age of a first-time buyer is highest in London at 32. Overall the average age is 30, up from 29 in 2011. This is likely to reflect the increase in the amount of cash needed to secure a property in the first place, now £29,218 overall.
In London, first-time buyers can expect to cough up around £78,823 on average just to secure a property, while buyers in Northern Ireland put down the smallest amount of money, at just £16,763. The average total house price for a first-time purchase is £171,870 across the UK, but again, London prices outstrip the rest of the nation with an average cost of £323,333. Even the leafy south-east can’t match prices in the capital, with an average of £212,635.