Bath property market update – Feb 2022

Bath property market update – Feb 2021

I must start with an apology – we’ve been so busy since re-opening after Christmas that I haven’t had a spare minute between viewings to analyse figures. We have been deluged with new buyer requests on our properties so this is the first update of the year. However, it has turned out to be excellent timing as we can include the latest Nationwide headlines as well as our own data.

For the first time in my 30 year career in Bath property, we entered January with only a couple of properties to sell. From looking across the market, we were by no means the only agent to have this issue and local stock availability has not improved since. As you can see from our latest update below, Bath homes to buy are extraordinarily thin on the ground and I believe there are several reasons for this paucity of stock. The pandemic has certainly caused a shift in demand from larger cities to less dense locations but there are longer term issues centred around the sheer lack of building for many years. Added to this, owners become very reluctant to place their own homes on the market when they cannot see what they want to buy – a vicious circle that is extremely hard to break.

The January market has seen yet more buyers added to an already crowded marketplace and it is not uncommon to encounter viewers at present who have been looking for half a year or more. Every single property we have placed on the market last month received multiple viewings and several offers (often ending with a best and final offer deadline). Propertymark surveys suggest an average of 29 buyers for every property at present and our recent experience would certainly tally with that.

The investment market has also kept pace with residential sales – demand for buy to lets has remained extremely strong and HMOs in particular have been snapped up as long term pension alternatives.

Nationwide’s latest house price index suggests average selling prices rose again in January by 0.8%, making a total of a 11.2% increase nationally since Jan 2021. The report also noted the total number of property transactions nationally in 2021 was the highest since 2007. Although Nationwide’s chief economist Robert Gardner anticipates a cooling down of the market due to higher interest rates, even he admitted in the report that “the market momentum and shifts in housing preferences as a result of the pandemic could continue to support activity and price growth”.

 



Top three Bath property headlines

Median asking prices in Bath are 14% up year on year

Average stock of available properties is 60% down year on year

Median selling times vary dependent on property type (flats slowest at 108 days and terraces fastest at only 22 days)



Figures below collated on 03/02/2022 and compared against our Jan 2021 data (in red)

 

Total property on market in Bath

Rightmove – 312 (665)

Zoopla – 280 (629)

OnTheMarket – 120 (291)

Home.co.uk – 309 (707)

New Instructions in last 14 days

Rightmove – 87 (130)

Zoopla – 55 (74)

OnTheMarket – search option not available

Home.co.uk – 57 (73)

Average Time on Market

Less than 1 month – 28.1% (18.8%)

Less than 2 months – 37% (30.2%)

More than 1 year – 14% (12.3%)

Selling Time in Bath (last 90 days)

Mean – 137 days (117 days)

Median – 50 days (69 days)

Properties for Sale in Bath by Price

Under 200k – 6.7% (7.7%)

200k to 300k – 13.9% (22.9%)

300k to 500k – 34.6% (35.9%)

500k+ – 44.6% (33.3%)

Mean Selling Times in Bath by price bracket

100 to 200k – 123 days (113 days)

200 to 300k – 136 days (104 days)

300 to 400k – 122 days (110 days)

400 to 500k – 108 days (134 days)

500k to 1million – 159 days (134 days)

1million+ – 180 days (101 days)

Property on market by Type

Flats – 47.8% (49.9%)

Terraced – 20.3% (19.9%)

Semi-detached – 14.8% (17.7%)

 Detached – 12.6% (12.5%)

 

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Bath market update