Homeownership has stopped declining for the first time since 2003, the government’s English Housing Survey has revealed.
Homeownership has stopped declining for the first time since 2003, the government’s English Housing Survey has revealed.
Owner-occupation increased from the 1980s to peak at 71% in 2003, but the percentage has since fallen to 64% where it stayed between 2014 and 2015.
Brandon Lewis, housing minister, said: “In 2010 there was a housing market where buyers couldn’t buy, builders couldn’t build and lenders couldn’t lend.
“Our efforts are turning that around with more than 270,000 families helped into homeownership through government-backed schemes since 2010, while the number of new homes is up 25% over the last year.”
Despite the government boosting first-time buyer lending with the Help to Buy schemes property analyst Kate Faulkner reckoned other factors are down to flattening levels of homeownership.
She said: “It's a bit cheeky of our housing minister to claim that the arrest is down to government, it isn't in my view, it is simply because we are now out of a recession, so it's sensible to buy as opposed to stay renting when prices from 2007-2013 in many areas were crashing.
“It's also worth knowing one of the main reasons for the decline in homeownership was due to the artificial 'boost' to home ownership from the sale of two million council houses during the 1990s, so a fall was always inevitable.”
The survey also found that between 2014 and 2015 the proportion of private renters who expected to buy has declined from 61% to 57% and the average first-time buyer age has risen from 31 to 33.
Despite the availability of cheap mortgage finance more homeowners own homes outright than with a mortgage, with the exception being in London due to the population having a younger age profile.
Kevin Purvey, chairman of the Intermediary Mortgage Lenders Association, said: “The apparent end to a decade of declining owner-occupation in England should not gloss over the fact that serious thought needs to be given to the direction of UK housing policy.
“The fact that the private rental sector is supporting more families with dependent children shows the vital role it plays in today’s society and how much it is being relied on to house our growing population.
“Policy measures in this area must not overstep the mark by undermining the sector’s growth and disadvantaging tenants by pushing up rental costs following a period where rents outside of London have remained stable.”
