Inflation – a reason to be cheerful or a cause for concern?

Inflation – a reason to be cheerful or a cause for concern?

The rate of inflation is important to construction at present, especially to those engaged in the housing market that might be wary of high inflation rates prompting increases in interest rates or deflation prompting prolonged falls in house prices. But it seems to me that people fall in reasonable proportions into three camps, those who fret about inflation rising, those who remain pretty relaxed and those who fret about deflation. So here is one graph that oddly might satisfy all sets of proclivities. There…

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Construction industry is £1 billion smaller as official growth rate is trimmed

Construction industry is £1 billion smaller as official growth rate is trimmed

Construction growth is far less than it was thought to be a month ago, according to the latest official statistics. And that means UK plc growth was probably slower that we thought too. The latest figures suggest that output growth for construction in the second quarter of this year was about 6.8% and not the 9.6% previous penned in. Meanwhile second third quarter growth came in at 4%, which was more or less in line with the estimate for UK construction…

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If the City punters are right brace for a double-digit fall in house prices

If the City punters are right brace for a double-digit fall in house prices

City money seems to be pointing to a near double-digit drop in house prices, with derivatives traders buying and selling on the basis of a 4.2% fall in house prices over the full course of this year with a further fall of 5.9% next year. The figures from Future HPI, the former Tradition Future HPI now published by Peter Sceats and Associates, evaluates derivatives deals made by institutions and other trading parties based on expected movements in the Halifax non-seasonally…

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Buyers and sellers abandon the housing market – that’s bad news for house building numbers

Buyers and sellers abandon the housing market – that’s bad news for house building numbers

The latest housing market survey released today by the surveyors’ body RICS paints a fascinating picture of the courting process between buyers and sellers of houses. The headline figure taken from the survey was always going to be that the majority of estate agents are now seeing house price falls. The figure for the balance of agents seeing rising prices against those seeing prices fall was -52, which was the lowest since March last year. This figure fits with the general…

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Mixed messages and some worries as payment delays in construction grow again

Mixed messages and some worries as payment delays in construction grow again

Experian’s latest figures on payment performance  for the third quarter of this year provide construction firms and their suppliers both reasons to be cheerful and reasons to be a tad wary. Both property and construction firms are delaying payments less than they were a year ago, but over the latest quarter, both sectors have become slower to pay up. Property firms on average are paying two days or so later than they were three months earlier and construction firms just a…

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Construction industry is forecast to face a second double-digit decline

Construction industry is forecast to face a second double-digit decline

Construction is heading for a very nasty tumble next year after the current spurt in workload fades. That at least is the assessment of the first major industry forecast released since the Chancellor’s spending review announcements. The construction forecast by Hewes & Associates suggests that after an unexpected 5.6% rise in construction over this year as a whole, the industry will slide sharply by 5.8% next year and 4.8% in 2012. It is worth noting that the forecast by Hewes…

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10 things that might be causing weirdness in the construction output figures

10 things that might be causing weirdness in the construction output figures

Can we accept unquestioned the construction figures presented by the latest preliminary estimate of UK economic growth? To do so is to accept that construction is enjoying workloads at a level that just three years ago were close to pushing the industry’s capacity to its limits. What’s more the rate of growth being enjoyed by construction – 14% or so over six months – is seen by many who follow the numbers as astonishing and for some incredible. But before launching…

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Construction growth continues to roar, but can you hear it?

Construction growth continues to roar, but can you hear it?

The UK economy grew twice as fast as the growth rate expected by experts, according to the latest preliminary estimate of gross domestic product. The GDP figure rose 0.8%, which is above trend growth and well above the 0.4% figure which was being touted as the average of the growth rates expected by experts. This suggests annual growth of 2.8%. A significant part of the recent growth spurt is down to the contribution that construction is thought to have had….

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Why the spending review might prove a turning onto the road to Nirvana for house builders

Why the spending review might prove a turning onto the road to Nirvana for house builders

What do the cuts in the spending review mean for house builders? Who really knows? But having tried to piece together what the implications of the Chancellor’s axe wielding are for housing, house builders, housing associations and contractors who build homes, I can’t help thinking what some might regard as the unthinkable. I may be deluded or befuddled by the blur of jumbled numbers, but far from being bad news, I think there is a possibility that things might pan…

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£10 billion less public cash for capital spending in second half of this financial year

£10 billion less public cash for capital spending in second half of this financial year

Just to get you in the mood for the savageness of the cuts to be announced later today here is an observation on today’s release on public sector finances. In the first six months of this financial year net investment, that is the envelope within which public sponsored construction broadly falls, has only dropped slightly on spending in last financial year. That means we haven’t felt any real shock yet. But if the Government is to stick to its spending…

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