Is Edinburgh Britain's Hottest Property Market?

A new report has found that Edinburgh isthe fastest-moving property market in Britain. The research by Zoopla looked at the 50 largest towns and cities in Britain by number of property listings and assessed the average time that properties spend on the market in each area.

The results show that properties in Edinburgh are spent an average of just 22 days on the market before going under offer. That’s less than half the average of 47 days recorded across Britain as a whole. The research has been widely reported as evidence that Edinburgh is the best place to sell a home, or that Edinburgh is the UK’s hottest property market.

Supporting this view is the fact that house price growth in Edinburgh has consistently outstripped that seen elsewhere in the country. House price statistics released by the government this week revealed that the average price of a property sold between June and August in Edinburgh £256,999 following an annual increase of 6.2%. That was almost double the rate of annual growth recorded across the UK of 3.2% during the same period.

On the face of it these figures paint a positive picture of the housing market in Edinburgh, but it is worth offering a note of caution. Although the Edinburgh market has been buoyant for home sellers for most of 2018, most of us tend to sell and buy within a relatively short timeframe and within the same area. If the market is favourable for selling your current property, when it comes time to buy the shoe will be on the other foot, meaning that you may find that you have to pay more for your new home than would otherwise have been the case.

It is also important to note that no regional market operates in perfect isolation. Many of the factors that affect the UK market such as employment, inflation and interest rates also affect the local market.

The biggest driver of the strong sellers market that we experienced locally is that there has been a shortage of homes for sale. Recently, however, we have started to see a rise in the number of homes coming onto the market, due in part to potential sellers being tempted to take the plunge by the growth in prices over the last two years.

This has helped to bring a better balance between supply and demand in the Edinburgh property market, reducing the pressure on buyers. As a result, the premiums that properties are achieving over Home Report valuation has started to come down and this will ease house price inflation in months ahead.

The message for those selling a property is therefore that while market activity is still brisk, conditions do not lie as heavily in favour of sellers as they did earlier in the year. Most properties are still selling relatively quickly but the high premiums that were commonly being achieved over Home Report valuation early in the year are less prevalent now as there is a greater choice of available properties for buyers to choose from.

If you are thinking of selling a property or if you have a question about the market, get in touch with us today by emailing property@warnersllp.com or calling us on 0131 667 0232 and one of Warners’ friendly, expert team will be delighted to help.

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