PROPERTY NEWS: More first-time buyers hitting the market

It’s the sixth increase in the last seven years and the third year running the number of new homeowners has topped 150,000 from January to the end of June. First time buyers now account for more than half of all new mortgages.

The bank’s researchers say: “Their share of [the mortgage business] has picked up since Help to Buy was introduced in 2013.

“The 128,317 first-time buyers [who have taken advantage of the government-backed 20 per cent interest free loan on properties up to £600,000] represent 81 per cent of those who have used the scheme following the launch of the initiative five years ago.”

The remainder have been existing home owners who have seen it as an opportunity to buy a bigger place or move to a better area which otherwise would have been beyond their means in the short term.

This group are eligible for Help to Buy as long as they won’t own another property when the transaction to buy their new house or flat is completed.

House prices in the three months to August increased 3.7 per cent across the UK compared with the same period last year.

Announcing the figures showing prices across the country in the three months to August were 3.7 per cent higher than during the same period last year and 1.9 per cent up on the previous quarter this year, Halifax managing director Russell Galley says market conditions are still favourable.

He elaborated: “While the pace of employment growth has recently slowed, a low employment rate and a gradual pick up in wage growth are helping to support household finances.

“This has been accompanied by interest rates still remaining at a historically low rate and a stable yet constrained supply of new homes onto the market further supporting house prices.”

However, as with all things, there is a downside.

The financial outlay for moving house in the south east has almost doubled in the past ten years, according to the latest analysis by Lloyds Bank, the Halifax’s stable companion.

“The south east has seen by far the highest percentage increase in the cost of moving over the last decade with a 92 per cent jump,” says Lloyds mortgages director Andrew Mason.

Back in 2008, homebuyers in the region which includes Bucks could have budgeted for the bill for stamp duty plus conveyancing, estate agents’ fees, the hire of a removal firm and the energy certificate on the property to tot up to £11,589.

By last year the average cost for upping sticks and moving from Place A to Place B in the south east had jumped to £21,373. In the past twelve months it has crept up to £22,200.

Nationally, people spend more than a third of their annual wage when they move home. In the south east it is more than half - a whopping 56 per cent of average gross earnings, based on last year’s figures.

“Rising house prices have been the main factor behind the increase in moving costs,” says Mr Mason “pushing up estate agency fees and stamp duty which are typically linked to the purchase price.”

The banker points out that the increase in property values in areas like London and the south east has increased homeowners’ equity in their home to off set the knock-on higher bill for stamp duty. But at the end of the day the hefty tax on house purchase has acted as a disincentive for owners to move as frequently as they did before.

Even tenants and landlords think twice before ending an agreement if it has worked well for both sides.

Hamptons International lettings index for August revealed an increase in renewals of rental agreements.

Analyst Aneisha Beveridge reported: “Moving is costly for both tenant and landlord.

“In a period of uncertainty where tenants’ incomes and landlords’ yields are squeezed, more tenancies are being renewed.

“With affordability stretched and less choice available on the open market, more tenants are choosing to stay put.

“And with landlord yields under pressure from high property prices and tax changes, fewer landlords want to run the risk of looking for a new tenant and suffering void periods.”