HOUSING NEWS

Ministers should consider strengthening the safety net for homeowners struggling to pay their mortgage, a report suggests. Help for this group introduced in response to the financial crisis will be largely withdrawn by 2022. Academics, commissioned by lenders’ trade body UK Finance, said the government should review its position. However, mortgage applicants must now prove […]

The growth in UK house prices is continuing to slow, according to the country’s largest lender, the Halifax. It said average prices rose by 3.9% in the year to the end of November, down from 4.5% in October. And it warned that growth is likely to ease further in the longer term, as wages fail […]

Home ownership can be a thing of beauty. Just as you don a pair of fur-lined slippers and spend more time on the golf course, you find you have paid off your mortgage. For the rest of your life, accommodation is effectively free. But this utopian model is becoming the exception. High house prices mean […]

Tenants typically spend more than a quarter of their monthly salary before tax on rent, official figures show, but there are wide regional variations. They paid an average of 27% of their gross salary to their landlord in England in 2016, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) data shows. The picture varies across the country. […]

The stamp duty concession for first-time buyers announced in the Budget will have a “limited impact” on housing demand, a lender has said. Stamp duty has been abolished when buying a first home up to a value of £300,000 in England, Northern Ireland and temporarily, at least, in Wales. For properties costing up to £500,000, […]

Philip Hammond did not give the “indexation allowance freeze” a lot of welly in his speech and certainly didn’t try very hard to explain its rather economicky sounding title but it’s a tax rise the government hopes will raise half a billion pounds a year by the end of this parliament and could have important […]

Stamp duty will be abolished immediately for first-time buyers buying a home of up to £300,000, Chancellor Philip Hammond has said. For properties costing up to £500,000, no stamp duty will be paid on the first £300,000. Mr Hammond said this meant 95% of first-time buyers would see stamp duty cut, while 80% would pay […]

Cities like Manchester have seen the fastest price growth House price growth was fastest in the North West of England in the last year, official figures show, as London again recorded the slowest rise. Property prices have sped up in cities such as Manchester but the UK average has remained steady, the Office for National […]

Buying a home is the most significant financial decision in most people’s lives. For tenants, paying the rent is the biggest monthly outgoing. So it is little wonder that house prices are an obsession for some, and a source of frustration for others. The financial crisis had huge implications for those wanting to buy or […]

Houses in Norfolk are among those falling in value, according to the RICS survey House prices are now falling in four areas of the country, according to the latest report from chartered surveyors. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) has said that prices are declining in London, the South East, East Anglia and north-east […]