The chief executive of Propertymark is in agreement with a Rightmove statement today, suggesting Iran War disruption has yet to reach the UK housing market.
The property portal’s latest monthly market snapshot reports a modest start to the spring selling season, and Propertymark’s boss agrees.
Nathan Emerson says: “Our member agents have reported an encouraging start to the year, with a sense of resilience when looking at the number of properties being placed for sale and the number of viewings on each available property too.
“Housing continues to play a driving role in the UK economy, and we are continuing to see progression regarding overall affordably.
“Across the last 12 months, we have seen a near 15% drop in the magnitude of fall-throughs reported per member branch, helping demonstrate a stronger degree of determination from both buyers and seller alike to complete on their transaction.”
Meanwhile Rightmove says that its latest real-time snapshot of daily market activity – up to the end of last week – shows that the number of sales being agreed is only 2% behind the strong market of this time last year.
And it’s actually 5% ahead of 2024.
The portal says this suggests that home-movers are continuing with deals despite headlines about potential mortgage rate rises and increases to fuel and energy costs.
In addition, the number of new listings coming onto the market over the same period is just 3% behind last year, and 7% ahead of 2024.
These stats suggest that seller confidence has so far remained resilient, claims Rightmove, with many continuing to take advantage of the spring selling window.
New buyer demand was already running lower than in last year’s busier market but has fallen no further since the beginning of the Iran war.
While the portal cautions that it’s too early to assess what the full impact of these geopolitical events on the market, it adds that it’s not seen the same kind of immediate and sharp response from movers that there was to previous events, such as stamp duty changes or the rapid mortgage rate rises in September 2022.
Mortgage rates remain below their levels of a year ago, but there is now upward pressure as lenders respond to the global uncertainty.
Rightmove’s daily mortgage tracker shows that the average two‑year fixed mortgage rate has risen to 4.51%, from 4.24% the week before.
This increase underlines how sensitive the mortgage market is to changes in inflation expectations and geopolitical risk.
Colleen Babcock, property expert at Rightmove, says: “Uncertainty is never helpful for market activity, and it’s come at a time when confidence and optimism would usually be building as the spring market gets underway.
“It’s understandable that many potential buyers may have one eye on news about mortgage rates and wider household costs.
“For context, the average monthly mortgage payment on a new purchase has increased by around £45 so far, but is still around £70 lower than it would have been at this time last year.”
