How's the prime property, London market performing after lockdown.

 

Hi, it's Danny Valencia here with My City Nest powered by Keller Williams. And today I'm excited to share with you as to what's happening in the property market in prime London area. Now, before I dive into the data, I just want to share you some very important slides in terms of expectations scenario and just in general forecast. So, if you want to find that what's happening in prime, London do stick around because I'm going to be sharing some great information towards the end of this, this video.

So, the first slide I want to share with you is GDP, and what's been happening in the UK and the history of the UK. So as you can see, we're working on a scenario. If you look at the very end of this, you can see that we're working on a scenario of a V shape recovery, which is quite frankly, that the economy growth just suddenly plummeted and then whatever caused that is resolved or removed.

And then the economy starts to grow back up. So this case being the virus, perhaps being contained and there I say it, finding a vaccine and then there's more confidence in the market. So again, we can only hope, and this is based on this scenario that there'll be a V shape a recovery. Now, the other thing I want to talk to you about is inflation. The reason I want to talk to you about this is because I speak to buyers and sellers on a daily basis, and this is something that always comes up. Danny! There's so many, so much money pouring in. There's so much borrowing. And I will say yes. And yet when we look at some of the best economists out there what they're sharing with us is that don't worry about it. Don't worry about it because we're borrowing a lot right now.

Yes, but there's also other countries doing exactly the same thing. So if we look at this other slide, as you can see, there are a lot of numbers, a lot of data, but if you just focus on 2021, those are very positive numbers when it comes to inflation. So again, these are economists and, you know, we can only go on the data that we have. No one has a crystal ball at the end of the day. So, the differences between now and 2007. Now, technically we're not in a recession, but we will be. And one of the things that I want to point out in terms of the differences is lending in 2007, we had 120% lending. That's crazy and irresponsible. So, right now we have, completely restricted. Our lending, responsible lending buyers are still getting the cash that they need as long as they can afford it, which is a very good thing.

Then we look in of course, we look at mortgage rates, but those of you that weren't around in 2007 or weren’t in the market in 2007, this may sound crazy to you. You might wanna cover your ears, but there were 6 and even 7%, mortgage rates that’s crazy. At the moment, it's all time low of 1 - 2%. So if you're buyer out there and you're holding back, you know, you'd be crazy not to make the most of these, all time, low mortgage rates. Now, finally, I want to talk to you about home ownership. The reason this is so important, is because in 2007, I've read somewhere that homeowners owned roundabout 30% owned the home outright 30%. Now, right now we're looking at over 50% so 50 plus homeowners in the UK own their property outright.

The reason this is important is because usually what drives property prices down is repossessions. That's really generally what drives a house, price, crashes it even, and what drove those in 2007. Now this time around, we're going to have much less of that because quite frankly, homeowners are going to have their property, own outright. And they're going to have so much more equity, even if they don't own the property outright. That's very important to note. Now, apologies, I'm going on and on about this, but I'm just so excited to be back and reporting to you. I see what's happening in the prime London area and just in general in the UK. So let's dive into the lonres report, which were, this data is coming from. So just a reminder, we opened our doors as professionals on the 13th of May, of course, adhering to the government guidelines.

So we resumed humans and other activities as important to note that at the moment, we still haven't seen the full impact of COVID-19 because we measure the journey of transaction in months, not days. So from the time someone views a property to actually complete that's in months. So in the next few weeks or months, we're actually going to be able to see that impact and actually report back to you. So stay tuned.

Now, what we have seen is a lot of activities when it comes to new instructions, a lot of new instructions coming onto the market. The first part of May very positive, but in the second part of May, we saw three times the amount of properties coming into the market for sales compared to the first part of May. So again, very positive numbers. For rental, and by the way, before jumping into rental, we're still 29% down compared to this time last year.

So again, we're not on the same levels as last year, 29% down, but still the activity is very positive. Now we will look at rentals, same kind of scenario. First part of May, lots of activity, lots of new instructions. Second part May we had 45% more properties come to the market compared to the first part of May. So, now let's look at sell prices and achieved prices and rental when it comes to square footage. So, very positive numbers when it came to the very first part of the year, first of Jan to mid-March, we had so much momentum and you can see those numbers here, 6.9%, 4.4% when it comes to sales. And when we come and look at, mid-March to end the May, these pre lockdown, of course, they're negative numbers. We're looking at minus 8.4% for rent and minus 4.2% when it comes to sell prices.

Now call me an optimist. But even though those are negative numbers, I think they're quite positive considering that we were completely locked down over the course of two months. So again, call me an optimist, but I feel quite positive about those numbers. Now let's look at transactions and new let's, annual change. So as you look at this slide, keep in mind again, we were locked down for two months, and so those numbers going to be significantly reduced when compared to same time last year. Now let's now jump on to the conclusion of all this data. What does all of this mean? So one of the things I'm going to point out is that the prime London property market has always led the UK, to recovery of recessions. And I think that's going to be, that's not gonna be anything different this time around the prime London market is, there's a lot of activity.

Again, we'll be completely responsible for us to actually say what's the midterm is going to look like. When it comes to rental, what we do know is when it comes to recessions and uncertainty, tenants do not, those would be buyers who are tenants. They're not going to go out and buy at least a good percentage of them. They're going to want hold and see what happens. And that means that, the market share when it comes to rental is going to increase naturally. But when I'm having these conversations with buyers and let's talk about buyers and sellers, when it comes to buyers, the conversations that I'm having is three things. Number one, if you find that perfect home, amazing. Secondly, can you afford to put that roof over your head? Yes. Great! Third why would you not make the most of the all-time mortgage rates, low mortgage rates at the moment?

I say, if those three things are there, don't hold back. Why would you, why would you don't know what's around the corner? I know people who have been waiting for three years, four years because of Brexit situation, and they're still waiting. The chances are that if you're on your flat at the moment with your tenant live in with mum and dad, or you own a property, but you're not happy. That's the thing you either going to be not happy. Having been locked out for two months, or you're going to be absolutely loving your home, which is, which is great.

And now if you're a seller, same thing, what is it you're waiting for? All we know is what's happening right now in the market. That's all we know. And the truth is that there are motivated buyers out there. So, make the most of it because we don't know what's around the corner. So, as ever that's me Danny Valencia with My City Nest, sorry if I sound very enthusiastic, but I'm excited to be back and reporting to you. But if there's anything that I can help you with, please feel free to reach out to me Danny Valencia here with My City Nest powered by Keller Williams.