Rents up! House prices up! Errr... Barratt Homes, Taylor Wimpey and Persimmon profits up! Who'da thought?!!

Chris and a housebuilder CEO celebrate...

SOURCE DAILY MAIL: Housebuilder Taylor Wimpey profits boosted 34% by Help-To-Buy, and average home prices hitting £230,000

The FTSE 100-listed housebuilder said sales were boosted by the Government's Help to Buy scheme, which offers an equity loan and a smaller deposit for buyers of newly-built homes. Taylor Wimpey said it sold 37 per cent of its houses through the scheme - which is scheduled to run until 2021. The strong profit gain came after the UK's third largest builder sold 13,219 homes last year, up 7.5 per cent from 12,294 in 2014, with average selling prices hitting £230,000 apiece, an increase from £213,000 a year earlier, which in turn helped boost revenue by 17 per cent to £3.14billion. Taylor Wimpey is the latest house builder to post strong results with Persimmon, another FTSE 100 housebuilder, recently posting 2015 pretax profit growth of 34 per cent, while Barratt Developments' saw its half-year profits soar by 40 per cent.

SOURCE GUARDIAN: Help-To-Buy helps Barratt Homes profits rise 40%

Barratt Homes predicted continuing demand for its houses as it announced soaring first-half profits, fuelled by a shortage of homes and the government’s help-to-buy scheme. The government recently extended help to buy until 2021 and introduced it for buyers in London. Some critics have said the move will simply push up prices in the capital, making houses less affordable. Pre-tax profits at Barratt Homes, Britain’s biggest housebuilder, rose 40% to £295m in the six months to the end of December as revenues rose 19% to £1.88bn. Almost a third of Barratt’s sales were made under the government’s help-to-buy programme, which underwrites a portion of a purchaser’s mortgage for a newly built home. The government is trying to encourage private housebuilders such as Barratt to build more homes to deal with a housing crisis caused by decades of supply failing to meet the demands of a growing population. Shortage of supply lies behind soaring house prices, particularly in London, and fears are growing that the market is heading for a crash after overseas buyers snapped up property for investment or speculation purposes. 

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