The Index identifies the critical factors that help determine both the desirability of an area and its potential to offer a return on investment. It applies these factors to try to identify the possible housing hotspots of today.
The RBS study, conducted across Britain’s 2,800 postcode districts, uses property data analysis and external experts (including 300 chartered surveyors and local estate agents) to examine a wide range of factors affecting potential future house price growth, together with current desirability for first-time buyers. All of the factors, when weighted and combined, provide an overall scoring for each area, allowing them to be ranked. The national top 20 table details the top two districts from each of the ten regional tables compiled. The regional tables consist of the top 10 areas in each region across Britain. Buying in an up-and-coming property hotspot, can help first-time buyers climb the ladder faster to their ideal property or location in the future.
The Index reveals that for savvy house hunters, the most crucial aspects determining future return on investment are the low house price to high income ratio and the recent house price growth rate of the area, alongside any regeneration prospects. The main factors determining the current attractiveness of an area are the quality of transport links and the area’s demographic (especially the age of the population).
The Index revealed that Openshaw, on the outskirts of Manchester, is the property hotspot for the coming year and is the ideal place for today’s first-time buyers to invest. Openshaw, on the verge of urban renewal, offers some of the lowest average property prices in the Index at £52,690, which is much lower than the national average of £183,199. Openshaw is benefiting greatly from a recent regeneration scheme and the building of a new major hypermarket. The area has also seen 14 per cent growth in house prices over the past 12 months, which is nearly double the national average of 7.3 per cent.
