From calls received and questions levied on valuations, I think the burning question on everyone’s lips at present is “what will Brexit mean for the housing market?”
I don’t mind admitting my initial thoughts that fateful Friday morning mainly revolved around how many sales might fall apart that day and I know I was far from alone among the Bath agents in this. However, contrary to what the scaremongers and headline writers would have you believe, we found there was barely a flicker of uncertainty over the weekend before normal service was resumed. Whilst the politicians continued to bicker and backstab, buyers and sellers girded their loins and just got back on with life – offers came in and were accepted, new properties were launched and completions achieved. The Bath market kept calm and carried on.
Interest rates and thus mortgages may even be angled more favourably soon but the underlying factor keeping the activity at a high level is that, over at least the last two decades, we as a nation just haven’t built anywhere near enough homes to even vaguely address the supply/demand imbalance. This problem is of course even more acute at a local level – I think it has been about 16 years since the last decent scale development of affordable and appropriate housing in Bath – and thus any machinations over the EU exit should be unlikely, on their own, to have any significant, specific effect on the city’s housing market at present.
Enough of my opinions though, here are the latest Bath property market facts and figures for you to interpret at leisure, collated in our usual fashion. Data collected this morning and compared to our May report (published 01/06/2016)
Total property on market in Bath
Rightmove – 429 (May 392)
Zoopla – 342 (May 312)
OnTheMarket – 140 (May 131)
Home.co.uk – 473 (May 437)
New Instructions in last 14 days
Rightmove – 139 (May 116)
Zoopla – 66 (May 58)
OnTheMarket – search option not available
Home.co.uk – 84 (May 84)
Note: Rightmove continues to class a reduced property as a “New instruction” hence distortion of figures
Average Time on Market
Less than 1 month – 31.07% (May 39.3%)
Less than 2 months – 55.3% (May 59.7%)
More than 1 year – 3.3% (May 2.9%)
Selling Time in Bath (last 90 days)
Mean – 60 days (May 85)
Median – 25 days (May 41)
Properties for Sale in Bath by Price
Under 200k – 5.07% (May 6.1%)
200k to 300k – 15.8% (May 17.1%)
300k to 500k – 30.2% (May 29.9%)
500k+ – 48.8% (May 46.6%)
Mean Selling Times in Bath by price bracket
100 to 200k – 36 days (May 38 days)
200 to 300k – 41 days (May 42 days)
300 to 400k – 51 days (May 47 days)
400 to 500k – 44 days (May 48 days)
500k to 1million – 91 days (May 59 days)
1million+ – 95 days (May 96 days)
Property on market by Type
Flats – 34.9% (May 32.4%)
Terraced – 23.6% (May 18.7%)
Semi-detached – 21.8% (May 20.1%)
Detached – 19.7% (May 21.4%)
