Member Article

Help to Buy aids Yorkshire first-time housebuyers with cheapest deposits in UK

Yorkshire mortgages require the cheapest deposits, according to a new report by LSL Property Services, and there has been a surge in first-time-buyers since the introduction of the government’s Help-To-Buy scheme.

Most of the first time properties in the North, Scotland and Wales cost between £100k and £130k. An average example of a first-time-buy deposit in Yorkshire & Humber was a two bedroom house in Hull coming in at £39,950.

In London it was a three bedroom terrace house costing in the range of £375k. Northern Ireland is home to the cheapest average first-time buyer purchase price, at £91k in Q1 2014, 42% lower than the average across the UK (£155,502).

However Northern Ireland was not the cheapest region in terms of deposit size – that title went to Yorkshire & Humber.

The average first-time buyer deposit was £15,280 in Yorkshire & Humber in Q1 2014, half of the average across the UK (£30,046).

Proportionally, the average first-time buyer deposit in Yorkshire & Humber was worth just 14% of the total property purchase price.

First-time buyer sales altogether climbed to 31,400 in March, the highest since August 2007.

David Brown, commercial director of LSL Property Services, said: “The number of first-time buyers has returned to a pre-recession high, just in time for the one year anniversary of Help to Buy.

“More first-time buyers are seizing the opportunity to have a helping hand from the Government in putting together a deposit. Help to Buy has allowed the bottom of the market to stay buoyant, despite property prices increasing.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Clare Burnett .