A year that was hellish for almost every sector has proved unexpectedly booming in one — property.
If January 2020 feels like a different world, let us jog your memory with this overview of what happened in the London housing market over the past 12 months.
The return of flipping
The number of homes bought and sold again within 12 months reached a 12-year high according to research by Hamptons International which found that around one in 40 homes were bought and sold within a year, offering profiteers and the simply fortunate the potential for huge bonuses.
James Hyman, head of residential sales, oversaw the double sale of the penthouse at Providence Tower in Shad Thames.
Contracts were exchanged on the £3.75m apartment last December/2019, and the sale was due to complete in April.
Then another interested buyer who has viewed the property when it was first marketed but was too slow off the mark came up with an offer that couldn’t be refused, and Cluttons flipped the contract on to him — making the first buyer a cool £350,000 profit without ever having stepped into the flat.
Hot tub moment
The warm spring plus lockdown led to a 1,000 per cent increase in the sales of hot tubs as those with gardens looked for new ways to entertain themselves at home (and aggravate the neighbours).
By June Wessex Water was warning that it was struggling to get water “through our pipes quickly enough” as demand soared. Later in the year as the nights got chillier fire pits and patio heaters enjoyed a similar spike.
House and garden
Being confined to barracks has forced people to take a long, cold look at their homes. And apparently they haven’t been impressed by what they have seen.
The average Briton has spent more than £1,000 on home improvements since Lockdown 1.0, according to a survey by wood burning stove firm Contura.
DIY virgins began attempting to upgrade their homes, with variable results, while others called in the professionals.
Meanwhile those with gardens or balconies attempted to locate their green fingers. A survey by Squire’s Garden Centres found that more than three quarters of people spent more time gardening during lockdown than they would normally, and a third spent ten hours per week planting and pruning.
Sales of house plants, meanwhile, rocketed 500 per cent during the first lockdown. The most-Googled varieties were the air-purifying snake plant, cacti, and calathea makoyana, prized for its striped leaves.
Working from home
The joys of home working, previously available only to the self-employed and those with very flexible bosses, suddenly became the new normal and a new acronym was born.
Hundreds of thousands of Londoners were unceremoniously booted out of their offices; all very well for those with space for an office (and childcare) but a horror for flat sharers who suddenly found themselves attempting to sound professional on Zoom conferences whilst using an ironing board as a desk.
It’s hard to imagine that WFH won’t continue, in some form, post-pandemic. The savings to be made on office space in London are huge and a recent survey by Trends Research found that around half of us would be happy to work from home all or most of the time. The long-term knock-on effects of this on where people opt to live will be tremendous.
Buying agent Sara Ransom of Stacks Property Search has already noticed a significant change in buyers’ wish lists.
Space for a desk has become hugely important to buyers, while proximity to the Tube is no longer a priority.
“Buyers can get significantly more space for the same money by being a 20 minute walk to the tube instead of the historical limit of ten minutes.
This has been impacted twofold, firstly by commuters not having to be in the office under such a strict routine, but also an increased desire for more exercise rather than less.”
Off-market sales
The number of London homes sold off-market – without listing on the property portals or any overt marketing – took off this year, in part because vendors didn’t want stacks of potentially infected viewers poking around their homes.
Some 15 per cent of sales in the capital were off-market this year, up from 11 per cent last year, according to Hamptons International.
One noteworthy off-market sale was of George Michael’s former home in Highgate, which sold for £19m following a furious (secret) bidding war.
Escape to the country
An unexpected side-effect of Covid-19 has been the way it has breathed fresh life into the country house market.
Stamp duty holiday sparks home-moving frenzy in southern commuter belt
Buyers anticipating a commute-free future with WFH are swapping homes in the capital for (larger) properties beyond.
The proportion of buyers with London postcodes registering with estate agencies outside of the capital almost doubled in April, according to Hamptons International.
Traditionally exiting Londoners want to be within an hour of London but the more affordable “outer commute” – areas within two hours of the capital – are gaining traction.
What buyers want is, of course, more space and a big garden, and good broadband speeds are an absolute must.
Houses versus flats
Traditionally the central London market is dominated by sales of apartments. This year, with the emphasis on space and privacy, the volume of house sales tops those of flats.
“Here in south London, the majority of our clients are expecting babies – they are starting to extend their families and are looking for larger homes to accommodate this so we expect huge traction in the family housing market,” said Becky Munday, Managing Director, Munday’s Estate Agents.
Meanwhile, apartments without outside space are proving a very hard sell. This is good news for the humble basement flat, once treated as a bit of a poor relation.
But Guy Meacock, director of buying agency Prime Purchase, said that things have changed now that buyers are desperate for gardens.
“Where once they were seen as a bit dark and dingy, the fact that they have their own access and a garden means that they are now really coming up,” he said.
When buyers are after flats Marc Schneiderman, director of Arlington Residential finds that big blocks are out of favour – residents are worried about sharing lifts and other communal facilities.
First-time buyers
In theory 2020 should have been a good year for first-time buyers, what with the stamp duty holiday and rock bottom interest rates.
But the chasm between wages and prices remains, and scraping together the 15 to 20 per cent deposit currently demanded by most lenders means that seven out of ten first-time buyers in the capital are priced out of the housing market, according to research by online mortgage broker Trussle.
Next year could bring some relief in the deposit department however, as Prime Minister Boris Johnson has promised to provide 95 per cent mortgages to help more buyers onto the ladder.
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