Richard Connolly, CEO of Rentplus, comments on the ONS UK House Price Index, Oct 2016, data:
“Over the course of 2016 house prices have continued to rise, although these figures paint a variable picture nationally with the East of England continuing to outstrip even London’s growth. Despite Brexit and the accompanying economic uncertainty, people continue to aspire to achieve the dream of homeownership. Sadly today’s data reinforces the fact that this dream remains beyond the reach of many. It shows that the affordability of housing is fundamentally a national issue not just a problem for Londoners and is complicated by the lack of supply.
“The Government recognises the challenges that this represents and in the Autumn Statement announced a series of measures to get Britain building more homes. However, we believe they should go further and seize the golden opportunity of January’s Housing White Paper and spell out how they will make provision to support the delivery of a greater mix of affordable tenure types. They have indicated that they will review the definition of Starter Homes so that it is not just focused solely on homeownership, and includes rental products – we hope that this means models like rent-to-buy. Unless we see new innovative solutions that enable working people to overcome the hurdle of unaffordability too many of them will be left behind by increasing prices. Today’s figures are evidence for this.”