"The stamp duty holiday added considerable impetus to a market that already reflected a shortage of available homes for buyers."
Its data shows that over the last twelve months the average price of a home in England and Wales has increased by £35,750, or 11.7% - the highest annual rate achieved since January 2005. Excluding London and the South East, annual growth rises to 15%.
The North West has taken over the top spot as the region with the highest rate of annual house price growth, at 15.7%, pushing the South West - the previous occupier of this position - into joint second place alongside Yorkshire and the Humber, both at 14.2%.
The North West’s rise to prominence has been assisted this month by Merseyside, where prices are increasing at an annual rate of 18.8%. All property types are seeing values boosted in the North West, but particularly semi-detached homes, where prices have increased from an average £180k in March 2020 to £215k one year later.
The West and East Midlands have swapped positions this month, with annual growth rates of 13.9% and 13.7% respectively, followed by the North East in sixth place – its highest position amongst the regions of the last twelve months.
Wales follows in seventh place, with a growth rate of 12.2%, which e.surv said could be due to lower savings on its stamp duty holiday than in England and second homes and buy-to-let landlords in Wales being specifically excluded from any such tax benefits.
The East of England, the South East and Greater London continue to have the lowest rates of house price growth, a pattern which has existed for the last four months.
Greater London has the lowest price growth rate of all the regions at 3.3%, and in March 2021, 11 of the 33 boroughs recorded falls in annual house price growth. This compares with just 3 of the 109 unitary authority areas elsewhere in England and Wales.
Looking at the national data on a monthly basis, prices in England and Wales in April rose by 0.7%. This is 0.2% higher than the 0.5% increase recorded for March 2021. However, the March and April 2021 rates are the lowest monthly increases seen since June 2020 and are perhaps indicative of a slowing brought about by the rapidly approaching end of the SDLT/LTT holidays respectively in England and Wales.
Richard Sexton, director at e.surv, commented: “This month, our data shows that on an annualised basis, prices grew by nearly 12% (11.7%) in April, the highest year on-year growth since January 2005, and this despite England and Wales having been in various states of lockdown and economic contraction since March 2020. This gives a real sense of how the housing market is performing, compared to the wider economy. It is also worth noting that HMRC monthly property transactions data for UK home sales increased in March 2021 to their highest ever level.
“The stamp duty holiday added considerable impetus to a market that already reflected a shortage of available homes for buyers. Our index reflects buyers’ decisions taken two to three months earlier than the actual completion of the house ‘sale’. This means April data points to decisions made in January and February when purchasers were concerned that the stamp duty holiday was about to end, with any purchase then being made too late to qualify for the tax savings.
“While anyone still in the midst of buying and selling will be hoping to take advantage of the stamp duty holiday, its withdrawal could be less painful because of the introduction of the government’s high LTV lending scheme. This should support buyers currently facing affordability issues and offset some of the impact of the stamp duty withdrawal. The scheme has encouraged many lenders to re-enter this market so competition will also be keen. We can expect low stock levels, low interest rates and continued demand, in part supported by government intervention, to support prices notwithstanding the end of the furlough scheme in June.”
