Rightmove has released its latest House Price Index which shows that the asking price of a typical home for sale has hit £360,000 – a rise of 9.9% since April 2021. The annual change in Scotland was 7.5%. The portal has reported a monthly rise of 1.6% and this is the third consecutive month that prices have hit an all-time high. Across every region of the UK and in every one of Rightmove’s lower, middle, and upper market sectors, properties reached new record price levels in April.

Over the last three months, prices have risen by £19,000. This is the largest price jump in any three-month period since the portal’s records began.

Rightmove also reported that 53% of properties sold for the asking price or above – this is the highest percentage ever recorded. In addition, properties, on average, achieved 98.9% of the final advertised asking price. This is the highest percentage since its records began.

In terms of selling times, properties are selling faster than ever. This time back in 2019, properties were taking 67 days to sell but in April this was just 33 days. Here in Scotland this figure is only 22 days.

The number of property transactions also remains high and is 21% higher than before the pandemic. This has been attributed to the imbalance between the supply and demand with not enough properties to meet the number of buyers.

Rightmove put the price increases down to the fact that the number of properties for sale was not high enough to meet buyer demand, leading to bidding wars between buyers. In particular family homes and 3/4-bedroom houses are in high demand leading to closing dates being set within days. There has also been high demand for rural properties as people continue to seek open space and larger gardens in time for the warmer months.

In Scotland, the average house price in April according to Rightmove is £182,310

What’s the outlook?

Over the last three months we have seen rises reported at 2.3%, 1.7% then 1.6%. This suggests that the pace of the price rises we’ve seen are tailing off. However, in Scotland the most recent monthly rise was 2.2%.

Rightmove has revealed that economic conditions such as the cost-of-living, fuel rises, interest rate rises, and inflation could start to slow down the current rise in house prices. These constraints can’t sustain the momentum of the last two years. Buyer enquiries have also fallen slightly compared to this period in 2021 with buyer enquires to estate agents down by 16%. However, buyer enquiries are still 65% above the figures seen this time in 2019.

If you are seeking to purchase a home at present it’s likely that you can see how fast the market is currently moving. Properties are going to closing date and selling twice as quickly as they were in 2019 and selling fastest here in Scotland. This is because the current supply simply can’t meet the demand.

There are some advantages to moving now – if you can secure a quick sale and purchase it becomes a less stressful process. If you are looking to buy – there are some things, you can do to make sure you’re in a strong position to have an offer accepted. We would advise that you have a mortgage offer in place and have an offer secured on your existing property.
Although the property market is slowing down slightly, Rightmove doesn’t envisage that there will be sustained price falls, but that house price growth will slow down in the second half of this year.