Helping Innovate Property (HIP) – Blog, Housing Market News and Articles

Repaying your mortgage early can save you substantial amounts in interest payments and could be a great financial investment at present. With interest rates at their lowest in decades now maybe the time to increase your mortgage repayments or consider paying off a lump sum.

Before you arrange to make overpayments it is important to check a few details, do your homework and understand the pros and cons whichever type of mortgage you have and/or are considering.
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Shocking research has shown gas and electric prices could rise to such an extent your energy bills could rise to as high as £5,000 per year.

The research recently published has been carried out by uSwitch.com and forecasters concluded that on current trends that energy bills could reach £4,185 by 2020, in comparison to £1,243 at the moment.

In addition to the above, the Government plan to implement smart meters in homes, which it is anticipated will cost taxpayers an extra £548 a year. Therefore, equating that the cost for gas and electric for each household could be as high as £4,733 within a decade.

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Mark Goldberg, Head of Residential Sales at the one of the UK’s most prestigious real estates firms, Hamptons International, believes that signs of a dramatic improvement in the UK property market mean those wishing to sell have a chance three times greater than a year ago.

Hamptons report that in 2009 there has been a month-by-month increase in activity across the property sales market, with London and the Central England region performing particular well. Renewed health and confidence in property buying and letting in the some regions is likely to galvanise the broader national market as demand increases.

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BoKloK is a new concept of housing, first pioneered in Scandinavia by furniture giant IKEA and construction firm Skanska. In the UK, property company Live Smart @ Home has the exclusive licence to build BoKlok properties and its first development is at St James Village in Gateshead, Tyne & Wear.

This is the first development in the UK of the BoKlok concept which is also currently active in Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland. The arrival and development of these exciting properties in Gateshead further enhances the constant improvement and regeneration of the area. The state-of-the-art, Scandinavian-style timber framed properties are aimed at households earning between £15,000 and £35,000 a year and are being sold on a rented, outright sale or shared ownership basis.

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Lloyds TSB’s (LON:LLOY) have announced a new 95% LTV mortgage product which requires a 5% deposit. By doing so it has claimed the distinction of being one of the few High Street lenders to offer such a high LTV home loans in these difficult times.

In these hard economic times, with virtually no banks offering a 95% loan to value mortgage, Lloyds TSB’s Lend A Hand mortgage scheme is a crucial step in encouraging other lenders to come out of their shells and will help attract first time buyers back into the marketplace.

For approval of Lloyds TSB’s Lend A Hand mortgage, a pre-requisite is to the holding of 20% of the mortgage value in a fixed savings account with Lloyds TSB. This feature benefits young buyers who can make use of their parent’s or other relatives’ savings to augment their deposit. While the savings will have to remain fixed for three years, Lloyds will maintain a hold on the amount until the homeowner has made enough payments to earn 10% in equity.

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Home information Packs have received a positive response from associated industry professionals who are utilising and seeing the benefits of the legislation.

A recent poll which comprised of over 150 housing industry professionals, ranging from estate agents to mortgage lenders and property investors voted in favour of the Home Information Pack legislation and continued development at the Land Data Great Housing Market Debate.

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As of today we now have some subtle changes to the Home Information Pack legislation that could bring added benefit to the exisiting HIP via some modifications including the Property Information Questionnaire (PIQ) which is now a required document.

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The Fuel Poverty bill has been thrown out of parliament as not enough MPs turned up to vote on the bill. With rising energy prices and the challenging financial situation at present surely this was a good move to help those less vulnerable than themselves, who can not claim £60k for a second home.

The Fuel poverty Bill was put forward by David Heath, the Liberal Democrat MP. It is estimated that there are currently 5.5 million households living in fuel poverty; this figure is calculated by the number of people where one tenth or more of their income goes on gas and electricity bills.

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With a move clearly designed to inject some life into the housing market, state owned bank Northern Rock has announced that it will resume lending 90% mortgages.

Currently the chances of getting a mortgage of more the 75% are very slim and this move could be seen as a government approved display of intent. Quite how relevant it is remains questionable and many have pondered whether the announcement is more publicity stunt designed to bring back consumer confidence rather than a definite assurance of impending lending.

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The state of the UK housing market is constantly in the news at present and the latest figures on home repossessions make more depressing reading.

In the year 2008 repossessions reached the highest levels for 12 years. A staggering 54% rise in instances of homeowners losing their homes equates to 40,000 houses being repossessed.

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Land Registry figures released at the end of February show that house prices in the UK have fallen to the same levels they were at in March, 2005. With the average property now valued at just under £157,000, this represents a drop of 15.1% over the last year.

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