DATA: ONS reported CPI rose by 3.8% in year to Aug 2025
This was unchanged from last month. They report “Air fares made the largest downward contribution to the monthly change in both CPIH and CPI annual rates; restaurants and hotels, and motor fuels made large, partially offsetting, upward contributions”.
DATA: Rightmove reported asking prices fell 0.1% in year to Sep 2025
They report(PDF) “The dip in annual prices is driven by London and the south, as the south underperforms the rest of Great Britain” and “The number of homes for sale in the south is up by 9% on 2024, compared with 2% elsewhere, and it takes an average of five days longer to find a buyer”. The Rightmove index also appears to be slightly more weighted to larger properties than the housing stock as a whole.
DATA: ONS/HMLR reported UK house prices rose 2.8% in year to Jul 2025
They report this was lower than the revised estimate of 3.6% in the previous month with a seasonally-adjusted 0.7% monthly fall. They also report house prices in the North East rose by 7.9% over the year while in London they rose just 0.7%. See Chart of the Week for more.
DATA: ONS reported private rents rose 5.7% in year to Aug 2025
They report “In England, private rents annual inflation was highest in the North East (9.2%) and lowest in Yorkshire and The Humber (3.4%)”.
DATA(PDF): Zoopla reported asking rents rose 2.4% in year to Jul 2025
They report “Rental market conditions are the softest for 5 years” as “Demand is 24% lower than last year on the back of lower migration levels and improved mortgage availability for first-time buyers” while the “Number of homes for rent has expanded by almost a fifth as new investment increases and some homes for sale are listed as rentals”.
DATA: ONS published Housing Purchase Affordability for the UK in 2024
They report “The median house price to disposable household income affordability ratios were 7.9 in England, 5.4 in Wales, 5.3 in Scotland and 4.6 in Northern Ireland in Financial Year Ending (FYE) 2024” and “In Wales and Scotland, a median-priced home was affordable for the highest-income 40% of households, compared with the 10% highest in England”.
DATA: ONS reported £1.4billion in SDLT receipts in Aug 2025
The total value of stamp duty land tax receipts (for both residential and commercial) was 18% higher than the same month last year.
DATA: Scottish Gov published Vacant and Derelict Land Stats for 2024
They report “The amount of derelict and urban vacant land fell by 3% (253 hectares) from 9,111 hectares in 2023 to 8,858 hectares in 2024” and “more sites were brought back into use for residential purposes than any other use (192 of the 335 reused sites)”.
DATA: MHCLG published planning applications for England, Q2 2025
They report “In April to June 2025, 9,300 decisions were made on applications for residential developments[footnote 4], of which 7,000 (76%) were granted” and “The number of residential decisions made was down 13% from the same quarter a year earlier, with the number granted down 8% from the same quarter a year earlier”.
DATA: MHCLG published building control housebuilding data for Q2 2025
They report the number of seasonally adjusted housebuilding starts in Q2 2025 was 16% higher than the same quarter last year but the number of completions was 19% lower. They also estimate that there were 196,500 net additions in the 2024/25 financial year, well below the levels required to hit 1.5 million this parliament.
DATA: Scottish Gov published Homelessness Statistics for 2024-25
They report “A decrease in homelessness applications for the first time in four years” with “total of 40,688 applications, 366 (1%) less than 2023-24”. They also report “There were 34,067 households assessed as homeless or threatened with homelessness” which as “An increase of 112 (less than 0.5%) compared to 2023-24, and the highest since 2011-12”.
DATA: Financial Market Expectations For BoE’s Bank Rate
The chart provides a summary for the expected future level of Bank Rate based on daily data. The One Year figure was 3.63% on the 17th Sep compared to 3.60% on the 10th Sep.
DATA: New Build Energy Performance Certificates, England
This chart provides a summary of the number of EPCs on new build properties, a useful leading indicator for net additions. The 52-week rolling total was 205,692 for the week commencing 8th Sep, up slightly from the low of 205,181 the previous week.
POLICY: BoE MPC maintained Bank Rate at 4.00%
They reported “At its meeting ending on 17 September 2025, the MPC voted by a majority of 7–2 to maintain Bank Rate at 4%. Two members voted to reduce Bank Rate by 0.25 percentage points, to 3.75%.”
REPORT: BoE published Agents’ summary of business conditions
They report “Contacts report a subdued housing market, in which demand has weakened and supply improved in part due to landlords exiting the rental market. Most report very limited price movement, with an increasing share of contacts reporting price reductions, and offers are generally below asking prices.”
REPORT: NLA reported on The Built Environment Sector
They report “the core professions and services in this sector collectively contribute 24% of Great Britain’s total GVA (£568 billion) and employ 12% of the workforce, approximately 3.8 million people” and call for government to define it as a “high-growth sector”.
REPORT: HBF reported on housing supply and affordability in London
They report “The capital is also experiencing a sharper drop in both housing completions and planning permissions approvals than the rest of the country” and “outlines a series of recommendations to get London building again”.
REPORT: SMF reported on Housing First
They report “Providing Housing First to everyone sleeping rough in England would cost ~£75 million in its first year and fall to ~£45 million going forward. Over five years, savings from lower service demand would generate nearly £200 million in net fiscal benefits.”
REPORT: Regulator of Social Housing published quarterly survey
They report “Landlords continue to invest significantly in existing homes, spending £9.1 billion on repairs and maintenance over the 12 months till June 2025” and the “12-month development spend dropped slightly from £14.2 billion (in the year to June 2024) to £13.6 billion (in the year to June 2025)”.
REPORT: Rettie reported on Scotland’s Land & Buildings Transaction Tax
They report “70% of Scottish house sales are now over the minimum £145,000 threshold on which LBTT must be paid” and “Revenue generated by the Additional Dwelling Supplement (ADS) on second homes (including buy to let purchases) now accounts for 35% of Residential LBTT revenue”.
REPORT: Santander reported on the homebuying process
They report “Over half a million failed transactions a year cause £950m hit to the wider economy, and cost UK consumers £560m directly” and call for “significant reform to rectify the antiquated housing system, including disincentivising gazumping and gazundering, implementing better upfront information from sellers, and expediting digitisation across all stakeholders”.
CORPORATE: MJ Gleeson published audited full-year results
They report “Reservation rates for the year averaged 0.71 per site per week, up 37% (2024: 0.52)” and “Excluding multi-unit sales, net reservation rates were up 20% at 0.53 per site per week (2024: 0.44)”. They also report a “Gross profit margin on homes sold of 20.7% (2024: 24.1%)”.
CORPORATE: Haworth published half-year results
They report “We are seeing sustained demand for our residential serviced land, although costs to deliver increased in some instances impacting valuations and the market seems to be softer, an outlook we consider may continue to 2026, particularly with uncertainty around the UK Budget and the timing of further rate cuts”.
CORPORATE: Springfield Properties published Final Results
They report “Private housing reservation rates remained stable, but a lengthening of the sales cycle reflected more cautious spending, prolonged decision-making by homebuyers and slower processing by conveyancing lawyers”.
CORPORATE: Winkworth published Interim Results
They report “the Group has seen a flow of sales of ‘let only’ rental investments, with up to 10% of the rented-only property portfolio being offered for sale”. In the short term, some of this rental stock is likely to return to the market as a result of vendors not achieving their anticipated price levels and choosing to relet properties pending a market improvement.”
CORPORATE: LSL published Half Year Results
They report “July was the strongest refinancing month of the year so far, as we expected” and “Mortgage pipelines are above historic norms, underpinning an expected uplift in refinancing activity across the rest of the year”.
CORPORATE: Barratt Redrow published Full Year Results
They report “Net private weekly reservation rate ahead by 16.4% at 0.64 compared to 0.55 aggregated performance for Barratt and Redrow in the comparable period (FY24: 0.58)” and “Our net private weekly reservation rate from 30 June 2025 to 24 August 2025 was 0.55 (2024: 0.56), with no private rental sector or other multi-unit sales (2024: 0.03) in the period”.
Chart of the Week
A consistent theme across the various house price indices and other measures of sub-national housing market activity has been the north-south split in performance. As shown by the ONS/HMLR regional house price indices below, the north and midlands of England have recovered from the impact of higher mortgage rates – with the recovery strongest in the North East. However, prices across the south of England have not recovered and are still sitting below their previous nominal price peaks. This result is not surprising given the expected impact of higher rates but the corresponding growth in homes listed for sale in the south of England could widen this gap further over the next year or two.
