It’s hard to know who to take seriously when looking at noises about the housing market so far in 2020.
We’ve seen some upbeat reports and the odd negative one about whether there’s been a so-called ‘Boris bounce’ in people buying since the general election.
When looking at the reports side-by-side, it seems likely there’s been a modest jump in activity, depending on where you are in the UK, without anything seismic changing.
This shouldn’t be a big surprise of course.
Though the general election gave us certainty that we’re leaving the EU, it’s hard to know how smoothly trade negotiations will go. Therefore we’re not entirely out of the woods when it comes to this ‘political uncertainty’ that’s been widely blamed on the housing market’s malaise in the past few years.
My advice would be, whether mortgage lending goes up or house prices go down this year, knuckle down and focus on the small picture.
There are clearly plenty of opportunities in the market, and many are still investing in property and associated financial services, as demonstrated by the news that the Property Franchise Group launched a financial services division with “buy and build” strategy last week.
Plenty still have confidence in the housing market, so stick to your knitting and 2020 could be as strong a year as we all hope for.
Ryan Bembridge, Editor, PropertyWire
