South West property prices take a tumble, but Bournemouth still on the increase!

The Land Registry has today released the property price data from March, and it shows a surprising picture. As you know, March was the last month for investors to complete on purchases before the increase of Stamp Duty on the 1^st April. With this in mind, it was predicted to be a heated month of property transactions and inflated property prices – but what actually happened was transactions tumbled by over 5% and prices across the UK fell by 0.5% - the greatest tumble in over 6 months.

The South West, having seen a high annual growth of 6.7% as at the end of February, saw one of the biggest property price tumbles in the UK – a huge drop of -0.9% in monthly property prices. This however had no effect on the property prices in Bournemouth which has seen yet another month of consecutive property price increases, +0.7% on last month which continues to exceed property price forecasts made before the start of the year. This brings the average price of a property in Bournemouth to £196,262 which is an annual growth of 7.9% compared with March 2015.

Neighbouring Poole also witnessed another increase in average property prices, +1.2% on the month and a massive 8.3% annual growth bringing the price to £242,054 for the average property. Southampton had a blip in March, dropping 0.1% in the month, but still grew 7.1% on the year, and Portsmouth grew 0.5% on the month bringing the average property price to £167,637.

According to a few mortgage company sources, March saw a decrease of over 26% in mortgage lending for Buy To Let, and an increase of 1.4% for residential home owners across the UK.

Could this be the start of a turn in the market towards owner occupied purchases? There is certainly going to be less competition from investors over properties for the next few months as the majority would have pushed through their purchases before the Stamp Duty change. The property prices may have dropped by 0.5% across the UK however is this substantial enough to all of a sudden allow priced out home owners back into the market?

The next few months will certainly be interesting to see. Could prices start to decrease further across the UK with less competition in the market?

Either way, Bournemouth is still showing signs of being a great place to invest in property. Not only are there some fantastic deals to be had, there continues to be a strong demand of tenants and the property prices are continuing to increase ahead of other areas.

To view the full Land Registry Report, please click - Land Registry Data For March

If you would like to discuss this article or any others why not send an email to me at  luke.marchbanks@belvoir.co.uk or give me a call on 07979123970 for a free, honest, independent chat.

All the best

Luke