"The mortgage advice process remains a vital conduit in helping to successfully deliver a variety of schemes, initiatives and products for buyers who are actively looking at new build properties."
A trend which is largely due to the rise in profile, prominence and performance of energy efficient features and higher energy performance certificate (EPC) ratings are becoming increasingly appealing in light of spiralling energy costs.
Historically speaking, new build numbers have not hit the expected heights and fallen well short of government set targets as the supply gap remains a tough conundrum to solve. Although, there is some evidence emerging that momentum is – pardon the pun - building. That’s if recent data from the National House Building Council (NHBC) is anything to go by.
Figures for Q2 2022 showed that housebuilding in the UK has made a solid return to pre-coronavirus pandemic levels with 40,289 new homes completed in the second quarter, 16% higher than the second quarter of 2021. This represented the highest quarterly figure since 42,354 completions were recorded in the fourth quarter of 2019.
Growth in new home completions in the second quarter was suggested to be driven by the private sector, where completions were up by 23%, while completions in the affordable and build-to-rent sectors were level. In the second quarter of 2020, when strict lockdown restrictions were in place, just 11,059 new home completions were recorded.
From a regional perspective, Wales was reported to be the only part of the UK to see a decrease in new home completions in the second quarter of this year compared with the second quarter of 2021, with 1,183 completions recorded, falling slightly from 1,189.
This data demonstrates some much needed positivity and it signifies a real injection of confidence for a housing market which is experiencing a slight lull – albeit this may simply be a seasonal one.
Looking at the new build sector from a lending standpoint, the mortgage advice process remains a vital conduit in helping to successfully deliver a variety of schemes, initiatives and products for buyers who are actively looking at new build properties.
With the clock ticking on Help to Buy, it’s apparent that intermediaries and borrowers will need to turn their attention to alternative ways to finance purchases, especially on new builds. This means there is likely to be an increased focus on shared ownership as this caters for those borrowers who may be struggling to raise a larger deposit or are happy to get onto the property ladder with a smaller equity share on a part rent, part buy basis.
Shared ownership remains a key area for us as a lender and will continue to form an important part of a wider product push to help more first-time buyers onto the property ladder. Over the past four to five years we have doubled our lending in the shared ownership sector and plan to further extend this number over the course of the next two to three years. And the intermediary market will continue to play a vital role in both helping us to achieve our first-time buyer lending targets moving forward and in allowing more borrowers to access the right solution to meet individual homeownership aspirations.
