Housing supply in UK fell significantly in July, new index shows

The number of UK home owners putting their listings on the market fell dramatically in July, down 13.2% across the UK and almost 15% in London, according to the latest listing supply index.

The majority of locations have seen new stock levels fall in the past month with Glasgow and Edinburgh seeing new listing listing fall by 30.3% and 29.7% respectively while supply was down 28.2% in Milton Keynes and 28.1% in Sunderland

The index from online estate agent House Simple, which used new listing on Rightmove in July compared to the previous month of more than 100 major towns and cities and all 32 London boroughs, also shows that while Swindon saw a 40.5% rise in new listing listings in June, they fell 25.2% in July.

Meanwhile, a quarter of the towns and cities that saw the biggest falls in new listing listings in July were in the south west of England. A fifth were each in the south west of England and the West Midlands.

In London new listing listings fell 14.9% in July and only the borough of Bromley saw increase in new stock, but this was still less than 1%. Bexley saw new listing listings fall by 31.4%, while new stock levels in Kensington and Chelsea, a favourite with foreign buyers, fell by 24.5%

‘Any hope that sellers were finally returning to the market seems to have been a vain one for the time being,’ said Alex Gosling, chief executive of House Simple, adding that the reasons are not easy to ascertain but it could be due to prices rising.

‘Or maybe they’re not confident about market conditions, despite the strength of the economy and the highly competitive mortgage rates on offer at the moment. Somehow, sellers need to be encouraged back to the market because there are buyers galore waiting when they do. It’s a very attractive market right now for motivated sellers,’ he pointed out.

‘The next few months are going to be important as the listing market looks to gather momentum heading into the last quarter of the year. We fully expected activity to drop off in the summer months, but come the Autumn the market needs to replenished with stock to realign the supply versus demand balance,’ he concluded.
 

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Source: Property News Spain