New bidding software available to letting agents for first time

By Graham Norwood

Bidding software that provides a new revenue stream for letting agents has been unveiled by a start up called Letsbid4lets.

The bidding software allows tenants to bid for rents, and was launched last evening at The Shard in London.

“We believe LetsBid4Lets is a game changer that provides agents with a whole new revenue stream and tenants with a level playing field. Three billion pounds worth of residential property was sold by auction last year and 10m people regularly use online auction sites” explains Spencer Rose, chief executive and founder of the firm.


“Our logic with this business is that auctions are a tried a tested way of selling property and people understand it, but no one has applied it to the lettings process yet. We believe LetsBid4Lets can provide transparency to both landlords and tenants” he adds.

He says Letsbid4lets can assist agents to let properties and can be used as a stand-alone marketing tool or in conjunction with traditional marketing.

All tenants that use the site will be pre-referenced before bidding, by FCC Paragon.

These references will last for 60 days so if a tenant doesn’t win on one property then they will be able to use the same reference to bid on another; tenants can also be prevented from bidding without first having viewed the property with the instructed letting agent.

https://www.lettingagenttoday.co.uk/breaking-news/2017/6/new-bidding-software-available-to-letting-agents-for-first-time

Spring selling season fails to materialise as house price growth stalls

By Isabelle Fraser

The annual rate of growth was 4.1pc in March, down 1.5pc from February CREDIT: PA

House prices slowed in March, according to official figures, as an increasing squeeze on consumers weighs on housing market activity.

The annual rate of growth was 4.1pc, down from 5.6pc in February, as the market stagnates due to a lack of supply.


Between those two months, the average house price across the country fell 0.6pc; this slump affected everywhere in the country except Wales and the West Midlands. In London, house prices fell 1.5pc in March alone.

House price growth around the country

Howard Archer at IHS Markit said that it added "to a mounting collection of weaker data and surveys which point to the housing market being increasingly affected by the deepening squeeze on consumers and their concerns over the outlook".

He said that these pressures would continue to intensify over the coming months and forecast house price will rise by just 2pc in 2017. Mr Archer added: "There is a very real and mounting possibility that it could come in lower than that."

The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors found that in March the market was "subdued", and the traditionally strong spring selling season faltered as new buyer enquiries and agreed sales remained broadly unchanged since the start of the year.

It comes as the Bank of England reported that mortgage approvals for house purchases dipped to a six-month low in March. The average price of a home in the UK is now £215,848.

Jonathan Hopper, managing director of Garrington Property Finders, said: “These official figures suggest the slowdown is sharper and started earlier than first thought.

“April’s surprise election announcement applied a dab to the property market's brakes, but this data confirms it had already dropped down a gear in March.

“While the speed and severity of the fall in annual price growth – down to its lowest level for more than three years – will alarm some sellers, such national averages mask the wildly different conditions at opposite ends of the market."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/house-prices/spring-selling-season-fails-materialise-house-price-growth-stalls/

Dropping UK house prices won't dent our confidence in buy-to-let

By Kate Hughes
As property prices drop for the first time in years, why are we still in love with property?

The property game. The stock market may far outstrip the performance of bricks and mortar, but we don't seem to notice. Getty

They have weathered tax hits and economic turmoil but this week, finally, the resilient UK property market cracked. If only slightly.

Prices nationwide fell by 0.2% in the last three months according to the leading measure of values the Halifax House Price Index – the first time it has dipped since the end of 2012.

It means property price growth over 12 months remains stagnant at 3.8%, says Halifax housing economist Martin Ellis.

 “Housing demand appears to have been curbed in recent months due to the deterioration in housing affordability,” he believes, caused by a sustained period of rapid house price growth during 2014-16.

“Signs of a decline in the pace of job creation, and the beginnings of a squeeze on households’ finances as a result of increasing inflation, may also be constraining the demand for homes.”

That said, rock bottom mortgage rates and the ongoing property shortage are expected to continue to prop up the market, and our love affair with all things bricks and mortar shows no sign of waning.

“Mortgage lenders continue to offer rock-bottom rates with HSBC’s lowest ever five-year fix at 1.69 per cent, which was launched last week, proof of that,” Jonathan Harris, director of mortgage broker Anderson Harris, says.

“The issue for buyers is affordability and bridging the huge gulf between incomes and house prices. There is changing sentiment; the best in class properties are shifting but we are seeing a number of down valuations from surveyors as caution starts to become more prevalent.

“Vendors are beginning to appreciate that their homes aren’t worth as much as they thought so we are seeing price drops in some areas. This is ultimately better for everyone as people who need to sell will be able to and those who want to buy will also be able to, resulting in a higher number of transactions and better fluidity in the market.”

“We are quite encouraged that the annual level is still above where it was this time last year, bearing in mind the huge increase in demand ahead of the introduction of the 3 per cent stamp duty surcharge last April,” Jeremy Leaf, north London estate agent and a former RICS residential chairman, adds.

'Looking forward, we are finding the market to be relatively balanced between supply and demand and still expect those people who recognise current market conditions to take advantage.

The market does seem to be finding a new, slightly lower, level and we are certainly seeing no signs of a more substantial fall.'

That’s despite the Government’s best efforts to take the property power from landlords accused of driving prices and, ultimately, social inequality, by inflicting a series of tax increases and allowance cuts on them.

Indeed, Brits are three times more likely to invest in property than in the stock market. But in doing so have missed out on far greater returns, according to Fidelity International.

“When asked ‘property or portfolio?’, UK adults overwhelmingly chose to invest in buy-to-let property, despite a raft of additional tax hikes for landlords and the fact that the UK’s blue chip index, the FTSE 100 rose by 19.7% in the last year compared with just 3.5% for UK house prices,” says Maike Currie, investment director for personal investing at Fidelity International.

“Investing in property has historically been dubbed as a ‘safe as houses’ option but in recent years the UK stock market has far outpaced the buoyant property market.

"While past performance is no guarantee of the future, [this week’s] data showing house prices have fallen causes concern that the property market is being pressurised by stretched house prices compared to our earnings.

“Other factors likely to weigh on the property market include rising inflation and stagnant wage growth. If inflation sees the Bank of England push up its base rate, the psychological impact on the property market could be significant.”

In the meantime, the latest data suggest those attempts to prevent property investment fuelling social inequality are failing.

The total value of residential house purchases in the UK reached £261bn in 2016, according to new figures from the Intermediary Mortgage Lenders Association (IMLA).

Around £152bn was provided by mortgage finance – up by £6.8bn in a year - and £109bn was made up of cash funds including the proceeds of existing property sales – up by almost £20bn over the same period.

The growing influence of cash in the house purchase market has, it warns, potentially negative implications for aspiring homeowners and home-movers who cannot stump up enough funds to add to a mortgage which their salary can support in order to afford a property purchase.


Peter Williams, Executive Director of IMLA, says: “Rising house prices and stagnant incomes mean that access to wealth as well as mortgage finance will increasingly separate the ‘haves’ from the ‘have nots’ in the property market if the importance of cash continues to grow.”

http://www.independent.co.uk/money/spend-save/uk-house-prices-drop-buy-to-let-housing-market-tax-economy-house-price-index-a7727381.html

Top tips to improve your property’s EPC rating

By Marc Da Silva

From the 1st April 2018, it will be unlawful to rent a property which breaches the requirement for a minimum energy performance rating of E on an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC), unless there is an applicable exemption.

But when it comes to improving the energy efficiency of their properties, a concerning 49% of landlords recently surveyed by E.ON said that they do not feel adequately informed about how to do so.

Not only does this mean they may struggle to get their property compliant with the minimum EPC rating regulations, but they also might miss out on other benefits for making a property more energy efficient.

Thankfully, Mike Feely from E.ON has provided a number of tips for landlords looking to improve their properties’ EPC ratings:

 + Don’t underestimate the importance of insulation in making a property more energy efficient. If the property was built before or around 1920, it most likely has solid walls. Solid wall insulation can be installed from either the inside or the outside. If the property was built after 1920 it’s likely to have cavity walls. These have a double external wall with a small gap between which can be filled with insulation.

+ Make a play of your energy savings standards – don’t just think of improving energy efficiency as something for meeting regulations, it’s a commercial decision too. Given most tenants are responsible for paying energy bills, some may be willing to pay more for properties that are energy efficient, so make sure you’re making the most of this as a selling point.

+ Without properly insulated windows, the property could be losing up to 10% of its heat. Double glazed windows make a big difference when it comes to lowering energy bills as well as reducing condensation and noise. Instead of double glazing you could install secondary glazing which involves fitting a pane of plastic or glass inside the existing window recess to create an insulating layer of air. Though not as effective as double glazing, secondary glazing still saves a significant amount of energy and allows you to maintain good kerb appeal by keeping original features such as sash windows.

+ EPC ratings look only at permanent improvements to the fabric of the building so think about long-term upgrades that will help to reduce heat and energy use. Simple things – sausage dog draught excluders and the like – will help keep heat in, but for the EPC you need to find permanent ways to fill the gaps to stop heat escaping through windows, doors, letterboxes and even keyholes.


+ For those looking to bring their properties completely up to date, consider renewable technologies such as solar panels with an at-home battery to store electricity for use even when the sun goes down. Be aware these will contribute to your rating only if they’re helping to heat the house, rather than providing electricity for other uses.

https://www.landlordtoday.co.uk/breaking-news/2017/4/top-tips-to-improve-your-propertys-epc-rating

The gloom lifts – and so does the property market

It’s curious how gloom, gloom pre-Brexit Britain’s property market has gained a much brighter outlook now that the result of the referendum has had three months to sink in.

And far from the Brexit vote giving the impression we hate Europe, a Mediterranean-style seafront house I took on only after Brexit has just been snapped up for £125,000 above the £1.45 million guide price making it, I believe, the most expensive single house ever sold on Portsea Island.

It's not that long ago that we also sold the most expensive house in neighbouring Gosport for £1.385 million.

But there’s more good news because buyer confidence has returned to such a degree that houses previously sticking in the market for far longer than either their owners or I would like have started to sell as well.

So Brexit is letting these owners exit the market with a smile on their faces and cash in the bank – or to invest in somewhere different to live.

It’s a curious phenomenon that things should suddenly get much brighter after such an outcome to the referendum. After all, none of us knows what lies ahead still, apart from uncertainty which has become the only certainty any of us have, if that makes sense.

Pundits are still kicking the future of our economy around like some battered football while politicians are saying we will trigger Article 50 and begin the journey to the EU exit door early next year – politicians apart from Theresa May, that is, who has the final say and, so far, isn’t saying!

I doubt any of us will ever truly understand the referendum. Portsmouth, after all, voted out yet could not be more Navy-focused than it is, a Navy that shares vessels with the French.

We also have a thriving ferry business forming the route by which many holiday makers and lorry drivers make their getaway to the Continent and subsequent return, allowing them to avoid the ruckus on the fringes of Calais.

Yet still the local populace votes to turn its back on neighbours who are nearer to us across the sea than Bristol is along the M4.

It’s something I’ll never quite understand but on the other hand I’ll be quite happy as long as it continues.

I would just like to point out, though, that my decision to replace my Audi with a Jaguar has in no way been influenced by the rise of Ukip!

https://www.estateagenttoday.co.uk/industry-views/2016/10/the-gloom-lifts--and-so-does-the-property-market