Budget 2015: How does the first time buyer Help-to-Buy Isa work? Here’s everything you need to know March 18, 2015 Poor saving returns, slow wage growth, and high house prices make getting on to the property ladder tricky. But there's finally some good news for prospective first time buyers, in the form of a "Help to Buy Isa" (Help-to-Buy-sa?), announced by the chancellor today. But how does it work? For every £200 an individual squirrels [...]
UK house prices: Mortgage lending enjoys best first quarter in nine years despite March dip April 14, 2016 Mortgage lending enjoyed its best first quarter in nine years thanks to buy-to-let landlords rushing to beat April's stamp duty hike, according to new figures published this morning. An average of 71,710 house purchase loans were approved in the first three months of the year, the data from surveyors e.surv shows – making it the highest opening [...]
Housing associations in £30bn mega-merger talks to build 100,000 London homes April 6, 2016 Three of the UK’s biggest housing associations are in talks to merger, with the view to build 100,000 new homes across London and the south east over the next decade. L&Q, The Hyde Group and East Thames said the proposed move will turn them into one of the country’s top four largest housebuilders with a [...]
London house prices: Why Foxtons’ chief executive Nic Budden’s salary is jumping 19 per cent April 6, 2016 It's clearly paying to be in the London property market right now. Foxtons' chief executive Nic Budden's basic salary is to jump 19 per cent for the current financial year, up to £550,000 from £461,000 last year. It's an interesting move for the London-focused estate agent, coming as demand for homes in the capital falls, although there has [...]
This is how sterling’s unstoppable slide will affect UK house prices October 12, 2016 After a freak six per cent fall when markets opened in Asia last week, sterling is in free fall. The fall obviously has implications for people going abroad – but what about people here at home? We asked the experts what the flash crash will do to UK house prices. Read more: This is how the [...]
A lack of digital prowess in the finance sector is hindering growth November 24, 2016 Lack of digital prowess in the finance sector is hindering growth. Here’s a sobering statistic. The average client-facing professional in the financial industry achieves a score of 20 on LinkedIn’s Social Selling Index (SSI.) The maximum score is 100. LinkedIn’s SSI measures the promotional competence of individuals, companies and industries on the networking site. The [...]
Home ownership is becoming a pipe dream for younger workers, think tank warns February 13, 2016 Owning a home is set to become a pipe dream for young workers on modest incomes, according to new research. Data from the Resolution Foundation found it is becoming increasingly difficult for young people on modest incomes to get onto the housing ladder, with just one in 10 set to be a homeowner by 2025. [...]
Jaguar has lovingly remade the XKSS, aka the world’s first supercar – a snip, at £1m November 17, 2016 If you're a sucker for classic cars, look away now. For while Jaguar has lovingly remade one of its most iconic motors, there are only going to be nine of them, and they've already been sold – for more than £1m each. Jaguar debuted the first "genuine" Jaguar XKSS in almost 60 years at a Los Angeles museum (because [...]
China M&A frenzy around the world set to continue according to Freshfields October 4, 2016 CHINA'S vast appetite for overseas acquisitions is laid bare in new M&A monitor by law firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer. The law firm found that China leads outbound M&A with 173 signed deals valued at $128.7bn, including a number of massive acquisitions in the first half of 2016 such as ChemChina’s $43bn bid for Swiss agrichemicals [...]
Property sales kicked off the year with a rise, HMRC property transaction figures show February 23, 2016 The number of properties sold at the start of 2016 across the UK was 7.7 per cent higher than in 2015, new figures reveal. Nearly 105,400 residential properties were sold in January and just over 9,600 non-residential, compared to 97,000 and 9,740 a year earlier on a seasonally adjusted basis. “Even as the housing market builds a head of [...]