London in need of affordable housing to power recovery, say insurers July 13, 2021 London will struggle to rebuild from the pandemic unless more affordable housing is built, insurers Legal & General have warned today. The L&G Rebuilding Britain Index show housing is the poorest performing measure – behind jobs and economic prosperity – with affordable housing falling flat in London and the South East and West of England. Nigel [...]
Pandemic: Average household wealth grows for first time during recession since 1940’s July 12, 2021 Britain’s wealth gap continued to widen during the pandemic, with the richest 10 per cent earning £50,000 on average, according to think tank The Resolution foundation. The foundation attributed the increase to rising house prices and a lack of spending opportunities. Jack Leslie, a senior economist at the think tank, said it was rare for [...]
House sales drop by over half as stamp duty holiday winds down July 12, 2021 House prices were down 60 per cent on the five year average in the first week of July as the stamp duty holiday comes to an end. This follows a bumper June, with the number of UK property transactions last month set to be the highest on record according to Knight Frank. Tax savings fell [...]
‘Busiest six months in 57 years’: Stamp duty holiday causes pandemonium in property sector July 1, 2021 The last week has seen chaos for buyers trying to beat the stamp duty holiday deadline, and long hours and stress for all other parties involved in the process. This week homebuyers were in a race against time to beat the deadline on the most generous stamp duty holiday, which ended at midnight last night. [...]
Want to pay less tax? Move to Kensington, Chelsea or Westminster June 30, 2021 The average house price of a Westminster property is £1,000,559.73, yet the average council tax bill is £945. Compare that to County Durham, where the average house price is £112,722.16, but residents pay an average council tax bill of £2,528 per year. What is happening here? Residents in Westminster and Kensington and Chelsea, two of [...]
Stamp duty holiday pushes 1.8 million houses into higher land tax bracket in Treasury win June 29, 2021 Intense market activity driven largely by the stamp duty holiday has pushed nearly two million UK properties into a higher stamp duty bracket in a win for the Treasury. Thanks to feverish market activity in the last 12 months, of all UK homes, 940,000 additional properties will now attract some level of stamp duty at [...]
Cost of buying first home in London more than doubles over last half century June 26, 2021 Today’s first-time-buyers in London have to pay two and a half times as much for their first home as they did five decades ago, according to new research. A report published by the Resolution Foundation today shows the cost of purchasing a first home with a mortgage in the capital was £212,000 in 1974 – [...]
Homeowners could still sue for damages amid leasehold ground rent reforms June 24, 2021 Even though Persimmon Homes and Aviva have agreed to change the way they operate in regard to leaseholds and ground rent charges, homeowners could still be entitled to compensation, according to legal experts. Following a recent investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), house builder Persimmon will allow its leaseholders to buy the freehold [...]
Twerk from home: OnlyFans helps users onto the housing ladder June 24, 2021 Forget the bank of mum and dad, OnlyFans, a social media site popular with sex workers, has helped thousands onto the housing ladder this year. The team at Online Mortgage Advisor has received just over 1,500 enquiries in the past 12 months where one or more parties per enquiry declare themselves as self-employed, citing OnlyFans [...]
Average rental prices in London climb 68 per cent since financial crash June 22, 2021 Rent prices have climbed across England since the financial crash in 2008, but nowhere more so than in London, where rents are now 68 per cent higher than they were in 2008/09. In the wake of the 2008/09 economic downturn, average rent across the capital stood at £977 per month, according to data from Ascend [...]