Weekly Property News Round Up – 04.03.23

Hello,

I hope you’ve had a wonderful week. Our team have travelled to Hong Kong this week for a meet-and-greet with some of our overseas clients.

Directors Nick & Tobi have joined our Cantonese and Mandarin-speaking agents to present our most popular investments to clients and offer them some unique incentives, face-to-face.

If you are interested to book a meeting with us, we have offices in London and Dubai and we would love to have a chat to discuss your goals. Reply to this article to book your meeting today.

Now, let’s take a look at all the headlines that caught our attention this week. I always try to summarise the links to save you from having to click through.

Episode 58: The Inside Secrets for a Successful Property Investor’s Mindset – The latest episode of the Pure Property Podcast is out now. You can listen to it on Apple Podcasts and all other major platforms.

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Property News This Week

• Prime Central London Market Forecast for 2023 Looking Good – Last year was not an easy one for the UK property market, with neverending interest rate rises, mortgage products being pulled from the market and governmental upheaval of epic proportions. In spite of all of this, the UK housing market has remained surprisingly resilient. The prime central London property market has been particularly robust in 2022, with strong demand and high transaction levels. This segment of the London market outperformed the wider UK property market in the fourth quarter of 2022. The forecast for 2023 looks equally promising thanks to a growing number of wealthy foreign investors focus on the PCL market, driven by the weakened pound.
• Net Housing Wealth Hit Over £7 Trillion for the First Time in 2022 – Savills estate agents have calculated that the net UK housing wealth exceeded £7 trillion for the first time ever in 2022 after ending the year on a cool gross £8.68 trillion, offset against the UK’s outstanding mortgage debt of £1.66 trillion. Despite this success, the next couple of years is likely to put buyers under mounting pressure as the effects of heightened interest rates, increased living costs and inflated house price rises stemming from critical undersupply become more prominent.
• UK Landlords Are Benefiting from Increased Rents and Low Voids – UK lettings platform Goodlord has published its latest rental index, revealing that Landlords in England are experiencing rising tenant demand that is driving rents up, combined with plummeting void periods as fewer tenants are inclined to search for new accommodation. Landlords being driven to exit the sector may be a factor in rising rents as tenants are forced to compete for the handful of properties available. It is no secret that the UK is experiencing a housing crisis and the government needs to take action if they do not want homelessness to hit new levels across the UK as people simply cannot afford a home.
• New Buy-to-Let Mortgage Cuts Announced by Major Lender – In a move that is bound to put a smile on the faces of homebuyers, The Mortgage Lender has reduced the rates across both its two and five-year fixed buy-to-let product ranges. The lender’s Fee Saver Remortgage product has been reduced by 0.40 percentage points and its five-year fixed product, offered at 75% LTV, has been reduced by 0.20 percentage points. Products aimed at HMOs have also seen a 0.25 percentage points reduction, while TML’s two-year fixed rate product has also decreased by 0.20 percentage points.