House prices still on the up

The average house price in October rose slightly, according to Halifax, but does this simply hide a wider issue of a growing supply shortage across simply everywhere. The Government has simply accepted delivering 1,000,000 homes by 202 will fail – but who actually believed they would – and I really fail to see how a £18m fund will help boost housebuilding, but I’ll give Gavin Barwell the benefit of the doubt.

The simple fact is that it was a surprise for the house price index to grow in October and counteracted the slowdown which has left construction at its lowest levels for a number of years. The rise was only 1.4% but an improvement on the 0.3% seen in September and meaning in the quarter ended it was a very healthy 5.2%.

A recent survey by RICS, the Residential Market Survey, is finding that people cannot find a house – the supply has become so sparse with what is available simply being unaffordable and to add to the agenda, it is expected Americans may seek to relocate to London following Trump’s victory.

So the answer to help – well the sector is asking for the Green Belt to be opened up for development, a fund of £18m fund to speed up house building on larger sites which in turn should provide thousands of homes. In fact the CBI has outlined some recommendations (all of which are relatively sensible). The £18m fund can be applied for to help planning issues that can cause delay but is the amount really enough.

In a world that is every changing, one thing seems to remain static and that is the plans to address housing. Over the last few months I have read report after report which outlines 1,000s of homes that are coming to market yet they all seem to stall for one reason or another (so maybe the fund will help?) but this alone will simply not resolve anything. The key is for LA’s and HA’s to really get building again and therefore it was reassuring to see plans for a Northern HA to do just that – let’s hope this continues more broadly.