Data reveals full extent of house affordability crisis in England

Data reveals full extent of house affordability crisis in England
Average home in England cost just over three times local median salary in 1997. Now it is just short of 10



It's just a London thing, say some commentators keen to play down talk of an unsustainable bubble in house prices. But a data analysis by the Guardian which has tracked prices as a multiple of local incomes in England since 1997 reveals how the affordability crisis has spread to virtually every corner of the country.

In 1997, the only district where median prices were above 10 times the local median salary was Kensington and Chelsea, west London, home to the rich and famous. Today the average property in England trades just short of 10 times salary.

The contrast with 1997 is startling. In population centres across England, prices for standard homes were barely above three times local incomes. The median price of a home in Bristol was 3.1 times local wages. In Manchester, 2.3, Birmingham 2.8, Newcastle 3.1 and Brighton 3.8.

Today the property map of England reveals how homes are out of the reach of buyers unless they are willing to take on huge loans. In real terms, prices in Manchester have doubled, reaching 4.6 times local wages. In Newcastle they are 5.2 times local pay, in Bristol the multiple is 6.2. Meanwhile Brighton now shares with Kensington and Chelsea the dubious distinction of having house prices that are more than 10 times local wages.

The M3/A3 corridor, south-west out of London, emerges as the part of England most hit by rising prices. A traveller starting in Chichester who drives to Winchester, on to Basingstoke, through to Richmond, across London and then heads out through Hertfordshire will not pass a single place in a hundred-mile journey where average house prices are below 10 times local wages.

Large districts far from the orbit of the London market now suffer from property prices of eight times or more of local wages; the whole of Herefordshire, nearly all of North Yorkshire, Derbyshire and north Norfolk, with Cheshire following not far behind.

The data will pile further pressure on Bank of England governor Mark Carney to intervene to deflate runaway price growth – and for George Osborne to rein back the Help to Buy scheme. The Office for National Statistics said prices were up 8% nationally in March compared with a year earlier, and 17% in London. Property website Rightmove added the remarkable fact that typical asking prices in the capital have shot up £80,000 since the start of 2014 alone, leaving young buyers in despair of getting on the property ladder.

Just as startling as the dramatic surge in prices is the failure of the builders to meet demand with new supply. Analysis by Savills published on Friday shows that in the capital, housebuilding has risen to 35,000 units from 28,000 a year ago, but remains substantially below the 50,000 new homes London needs every year. What's more, the upmarket estate agency admits that too much of what is being constructed in the city is luxury flats aimed at wealthy buyers, with the "lower mainstream" market especially poorly served. It is testament to the new norms in the housing market that "lower mainstream" is defined as £350,000 for a two-bed flat.

http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/may/23/data-reveals-full-extent-house-affordability-crisis-england

Total madness and ordinary people don't stand a chance.