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Tag: house building

England’s housing stock grows slower than the population for the first time in decades

England’s housing stock grows slower than the population for the first time in decades

The release today of the latest population estimates for 2010 revealed a reversal in the long-standing trend in England that the housing stock increases proportionately faster than the population. For more than a century the ratio of the number of people in England to the number of dwellings has, give or take a few blips and the effects of the World Wars, shrunk. The trend, from the best data I can find at the moment, was reversed in the decade…

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Construction jobs slump to lowest level since 2003

Construction jobs slump to lowest level since 2003

Construction lost a further 24,000 jobs in the first quarter of this year with the number of workforce jobs dropping to its lowest level since mid 2003. The labour market statistics provide further evidence of the slump in construction activity. Although it is worth bearing in mind that the more jobs rich repair and maintenance sectors have taken more of a beating than the new work sectors of construction. This would mean proportionately more jobs lost for a given drop in overall…

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Spiralling rents pose a tough question for Shapps: Where will the new homes come from?

Spiralling rents pose a tough question for Shapps: Where will the new homes come from?

The latest survey of the residential rental market by the surveyors’ body RICS is likely to wind up the pressure on the housing minister Grant Shapps to promote more house building. The survey suggests that rents are rising ever faster, driven by rising demand in a market where supply is constrained, as the graph taken from the RICS survey shows.

Speeding up public land sales by itself will not boost house building

Speeding up public land sales by itself will not boost house building

The Government today announced its plan to release public land with the aim of building 100,000 new homes. In reality the news, if that is what it is, has been dribbling out for some while. Few were opposing the policy of releasing swathes of redundant public land for housing and other development. The previous administration was keen to release land too. But politicians like a good headline. And a sound bite like “I am today announcing plans that will lead…

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Orders figures support view that there is cause for concern in construction

Orders figures support view that there is cause for concern in construction

The main message in the construction new orders figures released by ONS this morning is that the slope is downward and this is points to further falls in output in the future. And, to put them in context, against peak levels in cash terms orders for new construction work are down about a third. But more worryingly we don’t appear to be seeing the kind of acceleration in the private sector we would need to compensate for the losses faced in public…

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Why young folk can’t buy homes

Why young folk can’t buy homes

My patience runs thin when listening to the reasons why young folk can’t buy homes. And today I’ve had to listen to and read various interpretations of why they can’t, prompted by the release of the interesting Halifax sponsored research “The Reality of Generation Rent: Perceptions of the first time buyer market”. Call me unnecessarily reductive, but there is one simple over-riding reason why young folk struggle to buy a home, so simple it seems to be the most often…

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Do the house building figures really show recovery? Well not really

Do the house building figures really show recovery? Well not really

The latest house building statistics published yesterday tell us practically nothing about the prospects for the industry over the year ahead, other than things don’t appear to be getting worse and that we are still a huge distance from where we were three or four years ago. Why then does our housing minister Grant Shapps feel the need to pump up the value of what really are still very flaccid figures for housing starts? He tweeted: “These better house building stats…

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Thank God for the bankers

Thank God for the bankers

The latest survey of construction by the surveyors’ body RICS paints a generally brighter picture of the industry’s activity and prospects albeit with some rather dark patches. A crude summation might be that commercial and housing in London and the South East is doing “good”, while everything else and everywhere else is doing “average” or “bad”. Or to put it another, perhaps more cynical way, thank God for the bankers.

Little comfort for house sellers in latest market data and none for those wanting more homes built

Little comfort for house sellers in latest market data and none for those wanting more homes built

For those hypersensitive to twitches in the housing market the latest batch of data will not be comforting. Today we see the housing survey results for April from the surveyors’ body RICS, which its economists interpret as revealing a broad-based improvement, albeit within a market that remains fragile.

No prizes it seems in the New Homes Bonus for being a housing-friendly good planning authority

No prizes it seems in the New Homes Bonus for being a housing-friendly good planning authority

Yesterday the allocations were released for the New Homes Bonus. And Grant Shapps happily slapped away criticisms that councils in the North were being unfairly treated under the scheme saying three of the top five councils benefiting most are in the North or Midlands. His geography may have been correct when reading from the list of the biggest lumps of money allocated. Sadly he appears to have revealed either his ineptitude with statistics or his willingness to abuse their meaning.