The average 10 per cent deposit for a first-time buyer home has risen by 17 per cent, to £22,409 and the average monthly mortgage payment for those on the first rung of the ladder is now £1,032. This monthly outgoing is 39 per cent higher than in 2019.
“A decade of mostly upward rents has put further pressure on saving for a deposit and a rising market means that the goalposts have kept moving. Rents in the UK have risen by an average of 8.3 per cent over the past year, pushing them to 15.7 per cent above pre-pandemic levels. Inner London saw the fastest rental price hike in the UK over the past year as rents climbed 33.6 per cent compared to the same time last year.
After Competition and Markets Authority action, thousands of leaseholders who paid a doubled ground rent will receive refunds and nine more companies will remove these costly terms from leasehold contracts. The companies will also be forced to ditch contract terms so that ground rent increased in line with the Retail Price Index. The action brings the total number of homeowners that have benefitted from the CMA’s investigation to more than 20,000.
The South West saw the greatest decline with listings down 51.3 per cent over the past year. However, the smallest annual drop has been reported in Yorkshire and the Humber, with just a 14.4 per cent decline.