Property supply rebounds with 10.4% monthly rise

Following a typically slow August, property listings have bounced back with 69% of UK towns and cities seeing a leap in listings.

London saw a 16.5% boost in new properties listed, while the East saw a strong September for property supply with four out of the top 10 towns and cities for listings based in the Home Counties. Basildon in Essex jumped 68.1%, the biggest riser in the country, while new properties in Hemel Hempstead rose 52.2%.

Despite the majority of towns and cities receiving a supply boost in July, nearly a third (31%) experienced falls in new properties listed, including Falmouth, where listings fell by 27.5%.

Alex Gosling, CEO of online estate agents HouseSimple, commented: “The property market continues to defy predictions of a post-Brexit fall-out with a return to form after the summer lull. The figures don’t show an astronomical uplift in new listings after a typically slow August, but a more than 10 per cent boost in new properties is evidence of a resilience in the housing market that many didn’t expect. This certainly isn’t a ‘rabbit caught in the headlights’ moment for UK homeowners. Many clearly believe that the market is strong enough to sell in despite the ongoing political uncertainty.

“Equally, with the recent interest rate cut putting a spring in the step of buyers – and a further cut on the cards – a degree of market equilibrium may be restored. What was a sellers’ market before the Referendum vote and buyers’ market in the initial months after it may now be somewhere in between. This is no bad thing.”