30 Interesting Facts about the UK’s Property Market in 2019
Even if you’re not thinking about buying a home in the next year or two, its always interesting to grab a glimpse of some interesting UK housing-related facts. We take a look over some stats, data and facts about UK housing that you might not already know.
UK Housing Market Facts
The average UK house prices ended 2019 at £300,025. While that was a 0.9% drop from the November average of £302,808, it was still 0.8% higher than in December 2018.
No surprises, London remains the most expensive UK city to buy a home in, with an average price of 476,800. While that’s more than double the UK city average price of £218,800, Cambridge and Oxford aren’t too far behind, with average prices of £414,000 and £412,20, respectively.
Another city beginning with L, Liverpool, is home to the cheapest property prices for a UK city, at an average of £122,300, but Glasgow is a close contender with an average home price of £123,100.
Ilchester Road in Holland Park, West London is the most expensive street in the UK, with an average property price of £17.2 million. Princes Gate in Westminster, London is close behind with an average property price of £17.1 million.
10 out of the top 20 most expensive streets in the UK are in London. The most expensive UK street not in London is Charlbury Road in Oxford, at an average price of £5.3 million.
There were 1.192 million property transactions worth above £40,000 in the financial year ending March 2019, down from 1.207 million in 2018. But the total number of transactions was well above the 792,880 property transactions registered in the 2008-09 financial year.
Some 37%, or almost 2-in-5 Britons, don’t think they’ll be able to afford to buy a property in their home-town.
UK Rental Market Facts
If you live in England, the average monthly rent recorded between October 2018 and September 2019 was £700 per month. This more than doubles to £1,450 for Londoners. The lowest average rent of £495 per month, was recorded in Newcastle over the same period.
Renting a home is most affordable in Hull and least affordable in Gloucester.
Across Great Britain as a whole, the average rent tenants paid in November 2019 was £989, £20 per more than in November 2018.
Landlords bought 11% of all properties available for sale sin 2019, the same proportion as in 2018.
The level of rental stock available to rent across England and Wales has been declining for almost three years with almost one-third of property surveyors reporting that fewer new properties available for rent are coming to market.
Some 5.4 million households rent in the private sector, 2.9 million rent from Housing Associations, while 2 million rent from local authorities. That combined total of 10.3 million households who live in rented accommodation compares with 17.6 million households who live in their own home that’s either owned outright or being purchased with a mortgage.
While rents are rising at an average rate of around 2%, that’s still half the rate of earnings growth which was 4% in the Autumn.
People aged between 25-34 are the most likely to rent in the Private Rental Sector. However, there are now fewer tenants aged 16-24 in the PRS but more aged 45-54.
Home Building Facts
The number of new homes that have begun to be built between July and September 2019 was 37,220, 8% lower than a year earlier. However, during the same quarter, the number of new homes that were completed hit 45,190, an 11% rise from the same three months in 2018.
Over half of the UK’s construction industry (53%) said they expect to use modern building techniques, such as pre-fabricated methods, in their future plans.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan estimates 66,000 new homes per year should be built in London, to satisfy demand.
The Government is currently targeting 225,000 new homes per year to be built, including those for private and social renters.
Property Investment Facts
Worth £50 billion, the UK is the world’s second most popular country for investment in the Purpose-Built-Student Accommodation industry, behind North America.
Buy-to-Let investor cash-buyers slid to just 24% of all property purchases in the UK in 2019. All cash property purchases, including residential home buyers, accounted for just 26% of all transactions, the lowest level on record.
Buy-to-Let mortgage activity continued to slow in the autumn, with just 6,600 new BTL mortgages completed in October 2019, 1.5% lower than October 2018.
Lloyds Banking Group and Nationwide Building Society retained their crowns as the first and second biggest BTL mortgage lenders in the UK. But, Barclays Bank, Coventry Building Society and Virgin Money all overtook the Royal Bank of Scotland, who was previously the third largest.
Oxford is the Best UK city for BTL investors. At a proportion of 28%, it has the highest proportion of private sector renters out of 25 UK cities. It also achieves above UK average rent levels and has a low vacancy rate.
‘Other’ Interesting Property Facts and Figures
There are 226,000 empty homes across the UK.
At 157 products, there is now a record number of 10-year fixed rate mortgages available at an average rate of 3.01%.
A lack of sharing leads to the most arguments among tenant house sharers. Cleaning is the biggest issue among house sharers, followed by food and bills.
The collective value of homes across the UK rose to £7.8 trillion in 2019, a whopping £124 billion more than in 2018.
There were almost as many first-time buyer mortgage approvals as there were home-mover approvals in October 2019, 32,260 vs 33,370.
There isn’t a lot of difference in the average running costs of a three-bedroom home, whether you rent or buy: £1,634 per month for home owners, versus £1,576 for renters.