On 26th October the Land Registry published their September market report and with this we had the complete set of numbers for the month.
Here are the headlines.
• The Supply of new properties was down 18% on the same month last year and at 105,000 is well down on the six year average of 168,000. This undersupply is what is propping up prices. New instructions are coming onto the market at 3,505 a day.
• The number of homes selling however is up a third at 2,700 a day up on last year. In September 2006 there were 5,000 selling every day.
• Estate agents claim that there aren’t enough homes to sell and indeed the total number of individual properties on the market across the UK is over 20% down on last year and at 692,000 about 40% below the long term average of over 1m.
• Asking prices are unchanged on September last year at £230,184 but sale prices were down 6% at £163,533 (Halifax) and £158,377 (Land Registry). The gap between average asking prices and average sale prices is still over £66,000 against a six year average of £39,000.
• Finally, the length of time it would take to sell the current stock of homes for sale at the rate they are currently selling (Inventory) is a whopping 42% down at 256 days on September last year and again below the long term average of 308 days. As we have seen, the rate at which this stock is being replaced is also down which will all help underpin prices in the sort term.
To get the complete view of the market in addition to collecting our own numbers from approaching 98% of all homes for sale across the UK, we record the official numbers from;-
Halifax,
Nationwide,
Land Registry,
Rightmove.co.uk
HMRC
Council of Mortgage Lenders,
Bank of England