The days of the budget address being a great reveal appear to be long gone, with many of the key headlines dripped fed to the media before the big day. In terms of the property and lending market, this year has been no different.
George Osborne has kept his nerve in the face of growing calls to reduce support for the housing market and confirmed an extension of the Help to Buy scheme, right through the next parliament to the end of the decade in 2020.
Criticised by many as the cause of a potential housing bubble, the reality is that Help to Buy is no such thing.
The government should be credited for identifying the central role that housing plays in the UK economy. The scheme has been credited as central to the 15 per cent rise in new-build starts - with approximately one in three being directly funded by a Help to Buy loan, according to recent figures from Morgan Stanley.
Lending for mortgages is also up, driven by a return of first-time buyers to the market- a group hungry for the high loan to value lending the Help to Buy facilitates. None of this has caused overheating- after all, once inflation is taken into account, house prices are only up circa 2 per cent nationally.
However, arguably, the chancellor has missed the opportunity to refocus Help to Buy.
Most commentators would agree that the south east market now has its own momentum- it would have been good to see the scheme scaled back in the region with more cash redistributed to the regions who are still largely inactive such as Northern Ireland and parts of the north of England.
Mr Osborne also outlined further measures for the house-building sector, with support designed to encourage the building of a further 200,000 properties to address the shortage. A significant number of these will be built in Ebbsfleet, the first new Garden City created for over 100 years- a sign of confidence indeed.
Some £270m was allocated for the Mersey Gateway bridge project, something which in time is likely to have a positive effect on property values once it improves communication links for the area.
Finally, there was help for those beleaguered by local issues – in particular floods, with £140m extra pledged for defences.
This will hopefully prevent the blighting of substantial numbers of homes that have or may be subject to floods and which suffer a consequence fall in value or become unmortgageable as a consequence.
Richard Sexton is director of E.surv Chartered Surveyors, part of LSL Property Services.
