Have Home Prices In London Peaked?

By Author: Bradley Weiss
Total Articles: 272
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Price growth may have slowed, but across the board most Brits think home values will continue to rise. The government home buying stimulus has helped.


Do the sometimes-stalled housing price levels in London say anything to the would-be English homebuyer? Or for that matter, to the homebuilders or anyone investing in UK land for development?


On a month-by-month basis, probably not. Stocks in publicly-traded national homebuilder companies dropped early in 2015 on the news that prices had declined in December and January. But that says more about the sometimes-short sighted nature of the markets. In fact, year-upon-year prices in London were up at the end of 2014, and 2015 is showing evidence of increasing prices as well. Tales of a bursting bubble are, for now, an exaggeration that land investors and home builders should not use to build a business plan.


Home prices need to be viewed more broadly across the UK as London is an extreme case. Foreign buyers who buy luxurious properties at ...
... stratospheric prices in the Capital City have little influence on the price levels in Manchester, Leeds, Edinburgh and Southampton. In the February 2015 Markit House Price Sentiment Index from Knight Frank, a measure of homeowner confidence in real estate values, all regions of England and Wales reported price value increases for that month (Scotland is an outlier in showing a slight drop). And as far as expectations in the year to come, all regions showed even greater optimism about what 2015 has in store for them.


“The easing in house price sentiment indicates that the market is in for a steadier year than 2013 or 2014,” according to the head of UK residential research at Knight Frank. “While buying intentions are relatively high, there is less conviction that prices will rise strongly this year. Just 43% of households expect the value of their home to rise over the next 12 months, compared to 55% in February last year.”


UK Joint venture partnerships (JVPs) that are in the residential development business still have to choose which markets to build for: first time buyers or those moving further up the property ladder. What is clear is that Government schemes to boost first-time homeownership have indeed accomplished that goal. And in response, homebuilding has gone up.


The Help to Buy programme, introduced in late 2013, allows first-time buyers to venture onto on the ladder with a number of advantages. Some facts about the scheme:


• Government guarantee to banks on mortgages up to 95 per cent LTV (loan-to-value). This is of obvious benefit to working households which are currently renting and already have children and for whom saving for a deposit is difficult.


• Help to Buy programme users earn 19 per cent less than the average homebuyer (i.e., it is helping lower-income households to nonetheless become property owners).


• The average house price of Help to Buy purchases were about 11 per cent lower than the market average of £230,370 (i.e., lower-cost homes are moving well due to the scheme; i.e., it’s not a plan gamed by those who do not need it).


• Of the 118,830 new homes built in 2014 in England, almost 25 per cent (28,666) were built under the scheme. While no precise stats are available on how many JVPs were involved in those buildings, the Office of National Statistics (“Output in the construction sector”) reports that in 2013 private-sector house builders spent 11 times more on construction than builders of social housing.


Of course, it helps that mortgages are now available in all sectors at rates below 4 per cent (rates can be as low as 1.99 per cent for borrowers with 10 per cent or larger deposits).


Still, it bears mentioning that overall home affordability remains a problem. According to Shelter, the housing charity, average house prices are now 10 times the average wage of first-time buyers. In 2000, that number was five times the average wage. UK property funds directed at converting empty property to built homes, while driven by the profit motive, do effectively reduce upward price pressure by increasing overall housing supply.


Be it land investments or buying shares in real estate investment trusts (REITs) or other real asset investing, individual investors need to seek objective analysis of the prospectus. Speak with an independent financial advisor regarding any positions that can affect your portfolio and tax status.