The property market declined in the final month 2018 with a drastic 11.5% fall in sales between November and December, rebuffing any hopes of a pre-Christmas rush.
Provisional HMRC transactions data – based on sales over £40,000 that are eligible for Stamp Duty – showed that despite hopes of a rush among buyers to make a purchase before the festive period, there were 103,240 residential sales during December 2018, down 11.5% on a monthly basis and a 2.9% annual decline.
On a “seasonally adjusted” basis, HMRC said, there were 102,330 residential sales in December.
HMRC claimed that this was 3.6% higher year-on-year.
One critic said that the seasonally adjusted and non-adjusted – or ‘actual’ – figures were miles apart.
The difference was largely because of the gap between seasonally adjusted figures for November, at 116,600, and ‘actual’ figures, of 102,470.
However, whichever measure you use, the property market still looks set to have made more than 1m residential sales last year. The seasonally adjusted data shows 1,194,980 over the whole of 2018, down 2% annually.
The figures are provisional.
Commenting on the figures, Neil Knight, business development director of Spicerhaart Part Exchange & Assisted Move, said it was interesting how the seasonal and non-seasonal figures were “miles apart”.
He said: “The latest property transaction figures show quite a confused picture – the seasonally adjusted figures show a very slight decrease from November to December at 0.1% but a 3.6% increase on last year, while the non-seasonally adjusted figures show transactions were down significantly – 11.5% on the previous month and 2.9% lower than last year.
“But these are provisional, so it would be unwise to make any hard and fast analysis of them at this time.
“Especially as our estate agency divisions have had a very positive start to the year which suggests that the demand is out there, and whilst Brexit uncertainty is definitely having an impact it’s not holding everyone back.”
Mark Harris, chief executive of mortgage broker SPF Private Clients, said: “Indecision created by Brexit has also contributed to the fall in transactions as would-be buyers and sellers sit on their hands and take a ‘wait and see’ approach.”
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