DATA: ONS published labour market overview
They report “The early estimate of payrolled employees for February 2026 decreased by 49,000 (0.2%) on the year, but increased by 20,000 (0.1%) on the month, to 30.3 million” and “Annual growth in employees” average earnings in Great Britain was 3.8% for regular earnings (excluding bonuses)”.
DATA: Rightmove reported UK asking prices fell 0.2% in year to Mar 2026
They report(PDF) “The latest real-time snapshot of daily market activity shows that the number of sales being agreed is only 2% behind the strong market of this time last year, and 5% ahead of 2024” and “The number of new listings coming to market over the same period is just 3% behind last year, and 7% above 2024”.
DATA: ONS reported £1.1bn in SDLT receipts in Feb 2026
The total value of Stamp Duty Land Tax receipts covers both residential and commercial property, and was 3.4% lower than the same month last year. This data tends to be a useful lead indicator for transactions but the end of the SDLT holiday last year may cause some issues with year-on-year comparisons in coming months.
DATA: MHCLG published planning applications in England for Q4 2025
They report “9,600 decisions were made on applications for residential developments, of which 7,300 (75%) were granted” and “The number of residential decisions made was down 2% from the same quarter a year earlier, with the number granted down 1% from the same quarter a year earlier”. Data on the number of homes granted permission, based on data from Glenigan and similar to the HBF stats, was not published this quarter due to the need for further quality assurance.
DATA: MHCLG published indicators of new supply for Q4 2025
The quarterly building control data (starts and completions) now includes data from the Building Safety Regulator (see Chart of the Week). They also “estimate that 342,100 net additional homes have been delivered in England between the start of Parliament, on 9 July 2024, and 15 March 2026”.
DATA: ONS published data on clustering local authorities
The release provides the “Dataset and methodology information for our clustering and statistical nearest neighbours analysis, which groups UK local authorities with similar characteristics and outcomes”.
DATA: MHCLG published land value estimates for policy appraisal 2023
The “generic land values have been developed for use in economic appraisal for projects, programmes and policies” and, based on previous versions, care should be taken when using the data in specific locations or for other uses.
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 3.99% on the 18th Mar compared to 3.87% on the 11th Mar.
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 210,333 for the week commencing 9th Mar, slightly lower than the 210,898 total for the previous week.
POLICY: Chancellor delivered the Mais lecture
Announcements include “a closer and more stable economic relationship with the EU”, doubling funding for the Oxford-Cambridge corridor “with up to £800 million now available for buying new land and building infrastructure to kickstart development”, and “£1.7bn of new investment in city regions in the North to give Mayors cash and tools to bulldoze through roadblocks holding up city-centre projects and regeneration schemes”.
POLICY: DEFRA published first Land Use Framework for England
They will “Work with HM Land Registry this year to provide access to free, spatial land ownership data for larger properties covering the vast majority of England and Wales, excluding almost all homeowners”, though the footnote “Subject to impact assessment, including the rights and freedoms of citizens, commercial sensitivities or matters of national security” leaves them a lot of wriggle room.
POLICY: Scottish Gov published fourth Land Use Strategy evidence pack
“It draws on published materials to provide a baseline understanding of land in Scotland, and aims to increase awareness of the interplay between landscape, land use and ecosystem services.”
POLICY: Scottish Gov passed Building Safety Levy Bill
It “will see a tax charged on the construction of certain new residential properties from April 2028”.
POLICY: GLA and councils published London Infrastructure Framework
It “sets out a pipeline of 51 priority projects across transport, energy, waste, water, flood risk and digital connectivity sectors”.
POLICY: FCA launched Later Life Mortgages Market Study
The study will “examine whether change is needed to enable the lifetime and retirement interest only (RIO) mortgage sector to meet consumers’ changing needs, driven by effective competition in the market”.
POLICY: BoE’s MPC maintained Bank Rate at 3.75%
“At its meeting ending on 18 March 2026, the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted unanimously to maintain Bank Rate at 3.75%”.
REPORT: BoE published Agents’ summary of business conditions
On housing: “Demand is strongest among first-time buyers and at the lower end of the market, supported by rising real wages and relaxed loan-to-income rules, though overall sentiment remains fragile. Secondary market supply is tight, with limited choice and slightly slower selling times, while the new-build sector remains very weak due to poor viability, high costs and slow sales, leading builders to cut starts or build to order”.
REPORT: MHCLG reported on demolition or retrofit
The report investigates “how national planning policy and guidance informs decisions about the demolition or the retrofit of buildings” and “reveals a lack of clarity in both national and local planning policy when determining whether to demolish and redevelop or retrofit buildings”.
REPORT: Welsh Gov’s Affordable Housing Taskforce progress report
REPORT: Generation Rent on energy efficiency in the private rented sector
It “explores the impact of cold, damp homes and high energy bills on the wellbeing of private renters, alongside detailed analysis of the government’s plans to improve the energy efficiency and policy recommendations to make sure energy efficiency improvements mean renters are able to enjoy the benefits of their new warmer home and cheaper bills”.
REPORT: APPG reported on creating intergenerational communities
The All-Party Parliamentary Group on Housing and Care for Older People report “makes 50 specific recommendations to help create the conditions to support placemaking intergenerationally”.
REPORT: Onward with a proposal for land readjustment
“Land readjustment means that multiple owners, working with a developer, can pool their plots so that their land is developed as a whole” and “After development, that land is redistributed back to owners in smaller but more valuable plots”.
REPORT: Labour Together reported on local government funding reform
“The solution is a big bang package that combines nationalising the funding of adult social care with the reform of council tax and stamp duty into a unified proportional property tax system.”
REPORT: HBF published SME Developer sentiment survey
The survey shows “that the vast majority (70%) of small- and medium-sized home builders say that market conditions are limiting their appetite to invest in new sites, with developers in London the most pessimistic”.
REPORT: Homes for Scotland published land supply analysis
They report “Of the estimated 164,000 consented all-tenure homes referred to by the Scottish Government, rigorous analysis by HFS has found that 113,879 (69%) are in the control of home builders. Broken down further, 85,836 of those 113,879 homes have detailed or approval of matters specified in condition consent. 64,532 of the 85,836 are already under construction.”
REPORT(PDF): TYI on a loan-to-own scheme for first-time buyers
The YIMBY Initiative and Weston Homes propose a 20% equity loan scheme that could lead to “an extra 14,003 First Time Buyers” (that extra 3 people isn’t our typo!).
REPORT: Savills reported on the single-family build-to-rent market
They report “Appetite amongst housebuilders to sell homes to SFH investors has increased, and our survey of major housebuilders shows that, for many, this is now a long-term strategy”.
REPORT: Future of London on spatial justice in cities
They propose “a practical framework for advancing spatial justice through five rights: to a healthy city, to a home, to care, to difference and to a voice” and suggest diversifying housing delivery models.
REPORT: BusinessLDN’s growth commission published recommendations
The “key cross-cutting recommendations” include “Actions on tax”, “Speeding up housebuilding”, and “Winning the narrative that London is a safe city”.
CORPORATE: The Property Franchise Group published Final Results
They report their “Managed portfolio of 149,000 properties” was lower than the 153,000 for the previous year “reflecting landlord caution ahead of the Renters’ Rights Act and a more measured pace of portfolio acquisitions” and the “Sales pipeline remained steady at £33.0m (2024: £33.4m)”.
CORPORATE: Harworth published Full Year Results
They report “The impact of macro uncertainty, increased regulatory costs, and a slower sales market resulted in Residential Major Development valuations reducing at the end of the year. Looking ahead, there remains a short supply of high quality consented serviced land and the potential for demand-side stimulus to have a positive impact on the housing market.”
CORPORATE: Travis Perkins published 2025 Results Announcement
They report “The Group delivered revenue of £4,565m, down 0.9% versus the prior year” and “The decline in revenue was driven by the Merchanting segment with activity across the majority of end markets remaining subdued throughout the year”. They also report “The trading environment since the start of the year has remained subdued and this reflects a continuation of the weak UK construction activity figures reported for the final quarter of 2025”.
CORPORATE: LSL Property Services published Full Year Results
They report “The macroeconomic and geopolitical environment remains uncertain, with renewed concerns around inflation and interest rate expectations contributing to near-term uncertainty. We have not seen any adverse impact on trading across the Group in recent weeks, with front-end metrics remaining stable. We have seen some short-term strength in mortgage activity driven by changes to product pricing.”
Chart of the Week
This week MHCLG published the latest quarterly housebuilding starts and completions for Q4 2025. We’ve highlighted the undercount issue regularly in the past – don’t use this data for absolute housebuilding numbers but it has been a decent leading indicator for the more comprehensive net additions completions since 2016. However, the latest release raises another issue: it now includes data from the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) and this made a significant difference to the latest quarter’s data. It increased the number of starts from 25,011 (dotted pink line) to 32,100 (solid pink line). In theory this is great news as it improves the accuracy of the building control data – especially in urban areas where it tends to undercount. However, the only real use for the building control data is as a leading indicator where the trend matters but we now have a break in the data where it is no longer comparable to earlier periods. On that basis, I’m no longer confident in it as a leading indicator and we’ll have to wait till November for the net additions release to check it.
