DATA: HMRC reported UK residential transactions fell 28% in October
With just 76,930 transactions in October, this was well below recent highs and 22% below the pre-pandemic trend. However, this fall reflects the expected post stamp duty holiday lull as buyers rushed to beat the deadline and may continue for several months.
DATA: DLUHC reported net housing additions of 216,490 in 2020/21
Net supply in England fell 10.8% compared to the previous year, reflecting the slowdown in the housing market during the 2020 lockdown. See Chart of the Week for more detail.
DATA: DfC(NI) published Northern Ireland Housing Bulletin
The release provides a quarterly summary of the housing market in Northern Ireland.
DATA: ONS published long-term international migration estimates
The provisional and experimental estimates suggest net migration fell 88% in 2020, to just 34,000 people. This compares to 271,000 in 2019.
DATA: ORR published estimates of rail station usage in 2020/21
The data provides estimates for the number of entries/exits and interchanges at each station in Great Britain. Train stations linked to airports were among those with the biggest percentage falls in entries and exits compared to the previous year.
POLICY: Homes England launched Help to Build: Equity Loan prospectus
REPORT: JRF and Nationwide reported on talking about housing
The research finds that the many people in the UK holds beliefs and attitudes towards housing that stand in the way of building support for social change. It provides advice on how to communicate about the issues facing housing in the UK.
REPORT: Crisis published Homelessness Monitor: Wales 2021
The report provides analysis of the “homelessness impacts of recent economic and policy developments in Wales”.
REPORT: GLA reported on “Who moves into social housing in London”
The report investigates “data on social housing lettings in London, in order to understand more about the characteristics of people who move into social housing in London”.
REPORT: Nationwide reported on first time buyer affordability
The report provides a summary of the affordability pressures facing prospective first time buyers on average earnings. However, it does not tell us about actual first time buyer affordability as they tend to have higher incomes than average.
REPORT: Savills reported on affordable housing supply
The report looks at the opportunities and challenges facing the affordable housing sector.
Chart of the Week
The fall in net housing supply for England during 2020/21 was not a surprise given the much earlier availability of EPC and Council Tax data. However, it still provides a useful guide to housing supply including its various components. The largest component of net housing supply is new build completions and we’ve been lacking a reliable leading indicator for it. However, with the latest net supply data, we can now test the improvements to DLUHC’s quarterly Indicators of New Supply data and find out if it’s become a more reliable leading indicator in recent years. To do this, we have rebased the Indicators data to the 2018/19 Net Additions new build data. As the chart below suggests, it has then reliably predicted the trend in completions over the last two years. If it continues to be an accurate leading indicator then rebasing the latest quarterly data suggests new build completions rose to 230,000 in the year to Q2 2021. That would be the highest level in a long time.
