First time buyers bounce back on to the property market as stamp duty changes take effect August 22, 2016 First-time buyers have finally started taking a bigger slice of London’s most exclusive postcodes, as stamp duty changes scare off landlords. The proportion of prime London home purchases made by first-time buyers went from 22 per cent in the first quarter of the year, up to 34 per cent in the second, according to data from [...]
See inside the property Dominic Chappell paid for with a £1.5m loan from BHS August 21, 2016 Dominic Chappell, the bankrupt who bought BHS for £1, used a loan from BHS to pay off a mortgage on his family's home. Chappell told the parliamentary committee investigating the collapse of BHS that a £1.5m loan had been paid out to Retail Acquisitions – the company majority-owned by Dominic Chappell that bought BHS. Documents [...]
Here’s why now is not a great time to try and sell your home August 19, 2016 If you're trying to sell your home, now is probably a bad time to do it – demand has dropped by a third over the past year. In July, the number of house hunters registered fell to an average 298 per estate agent branch, a drop of 35 per cent year-on-year, according to the National Association of [...]
Rich Europeans exit prime central London homes August 19, 2016 International tenants are falling out of love with prime central London homes. According to data from Hamptons International, the number of tenants in the centre of London has been falling steadily since May 2013, dropping by eight per cent between then and May this year. Fionnuala Earley, research director at Hamptons International, said the rental [...]
Shoreditch hipsters fail to drag financial services from the City August 19, 2016 Financial services firms are still flocking to the City despite the attractions of hipster hubs such as Shoreditch and Old Street. Data from estate agent Stirling Ackroyd showed that between the the second quarter of 2015 and the first quarter of 2016 the number of financial businesses in City postcodes increased by 8.6 per cent. In [...]
UK Commercial Property Trust reports fall in asset value August 18, 2016 UK Commercial Property Trust (UKCPT) reported a fall in the value of its assets per share yesterday, down by 0.2 per cent in the six months to the 30 June. The news comes after Norway’s sovereign wealth fund cut the value of its UK real estate holdings due to the Brexit vote and the uncertainty [...]
Property of the Week: Tour de France presenter’s studio flat in Soho is ingeniously designed August 18, 2016 Simple living in the messy heart of London – that’s what this extraordinarily modern studio flat offers in Soho for £699,000. Owned by ITV’s Tour de France presenter Gary Imlach, it’s a perfect pied-a-terre tucked away in a gated period building on Broadwick Street. To get to it, you need to climb a set of [...]
Opinion: Rightmove’s housing index shows that London may have fallen, but it’s sunny in the Shires August 18, 2016 The latest housing index from Rightmove has caused a stir, revealing that prices have hit their lowest point since November and have dropped 1.2 per cent nationwide. Londoners in particular seem hardest hit with the average price falling 2.6 per cent. It’s very easy to put the entire blame on Brexit and increases in Stamp Duty, but [...]
New homes on sale in London this weekend: from Old Street’s industrial warehouses to family homes in Wimbledon Village August 18, 2016 City Wharf, Old Street From £770,000 Ten two bed apartments have been released for sale in this completed development on City Road. It’s in the heart of Tech City, which has just received a £25m boost from central government. In total, there are 64 studios to three bedroom apartments in the scheme overlooking the 19th [...]
House sales are suffering in areas that voted to stay in the EU August 18, 2016 The property market has become skewed by how people voted in the EU referendum, with areas that voted to leave the EU becoming more active after the Brexit vote – and in areas that voted to stay, buyers ran for the hills. The number of sales that have fallen through in areas that voted Remain jumped [...]