A long road to market normality?
Many estate agents have been back to work for a month now, newspaper headlines on property have been crammed full of doom & gloom but how has the Bath property market fared under lockdown and are we now bouncing back? Working with limited staff, appointment only offices and strict viewing protocols has been tough going but I know we’re not alone in experiencing extremely high levels of activity over the last month. It would seem a combination of pent up demand, low supply levels and a post lockdown desire for private outside space have generated viewing number exceeding pre March levels. Happily for our own clients, this has now moved onwards to translate into agreed sales over the last fortnight at or above average levels. Whilst these numbers will take months to trickle through the Land Registry into the public domain, the reported fears of price drops and market contractions so far seem to be at least partially unfounded.
Whilst the general picture over the last month has been more positive than feared, some sectors of the local market look to be a little less well off. Reports last week from both Rightmove and Zoopla suggest interest in 3-4 bed family homes is at peak levels whereas flats may have dropped in search popularity. Locally, we’ve also noticed that newly built homes seem to take up a significant proportion of the “on market” stock (around 24% at present).
Due to the market all but halting over the 8 weeks of lockdown, some current market data can be a bit erratic. For example, there is little point looking at recent completion figures when solicitors refused to move a significant proportion of transactions between late March and mid May. Surveyors ceasing work until late May also held up ongoing sales. However, I think we can get some insights by comparing current “on market” stats with the same period last year.
Current market data (13th June 2020) in comparison to archive data from July 2019
Total property on market in Bath
Rightmove – 787 vs 895
Zoopla – 678 vs 601
OnTheMarket – 572 vs 576
Home.co.uk – 800 vs 881
New Instructions in last 14 days
Rightmove – 168 vs 227
Zoopla – 124 vs 97
OnTheMarket – search option not available
Home.co.uk – 95 vs 131
Average Time on Market
Less than 1 month – 19.6% vs 27%
Less than 2 months – 22.1% vs 45.5%
More than 1 year – 12.5% vs 8.3%
Selling Time in Bath (last 90 days)
Mean – 152 days vs 117 days
Median – 89 days vs 56 days
Properties for Sale in Bath by Price
Under 200k – 7.6% vs 7.7%
200k to 300k – 19.3% vs 18.5%
300k to 500k – 36.5% vs 36.6%
500k+ – 36.5% vs 36.5%
Mean Selling Times in Bath by price bracket
100 to 200k – 70 days vs 95 days
200 to 300k – 200 days vs 99 days
300 to 400k – 138 days vs 108 days
400 to 500k – 120 days vs 104 days
500k to 1million – 115 days vs 129 days
1million+ – 293 days vs 215 days
Property on market by Type
Flats – 39.9% vs 38.3%
Terraced – 22.2% vs 22.8%
Semi-detached – 22.3% vs 22.8%
Detached – 15.6% vs 16.1%
Potential current effects of lockdown?
Circa 11% decrease in property stock levels year on year
48% – 75% increase in time on market year on year dependent on property type
23% – 37% increase in selling time year on year (mean vs median)
Median asking prices unchanged year on year
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