How do people feel about the state of the housing market?

Is the recovery of recent months going to continue? Lots of house builders are raising money to buy land and restarting mothballed projects.

But on the other hand, the 'experts' seem to think we're heading for another drop next year...

Good news methinks...someone has to be brave enough to kick-start any recovery aspirations, not hearing too much sense from the HCA, or at least, nothing to get wxcited about and the promised 'newbie' govt Construction Guru is very quiet also - or is that role not filled yet - I'll do it...Gissajob!

 I think the housing market will be fine as long as unemployment does not rise too high, knocking confidence, or supply of housing (especially in South East where supply is currently low) increases too rapidly. Basically the media seems to be on-side now and like it or not, they have a huge role to play in these because it affects sentiment. I don't know if it's just me but I get a sense that the media now wants to see the economy turn a corner, and I hope they can make it so. It's the least Peston and his evil army of doom-mongers can do for the rest of us.

Eloquently put BB, I would agree that unemployment is perhaps one of the major key risk factors but the HCA appear to be inviting the ‘bigger-boys' to get involved?

Back in April this year HCA announced "The HCA delivered some 50,000 new, affordable homes across England and hit its target to invest £3.9bn on its national housing and regeneration programme in 2008/09. Despite the downturn the agency has been able to increase the number of completed rental and low
cost home ownership (LCHO) properties as well as the number of rental starts compared with last financial year. The preliminary end of year results outlined today showed that the agency exceeded several of its output targets, including completion of rental properties, reclamation of brownfield land and creation of employment floor space.

In May it says "The HCA has an additional £635 million from the April 2009 Budget to stimulate the housing market, including Kickstart Housing Delivery and funding for local authorities to deliver new council housing.

This is broken down as follows:

• £400m to unlock stalled developments - Kickstart Housing Delivery
• £50 million to enable local authorities to deliver new social housing (plus £50 million prudential borrowing)
• up to £80 million to support delivery of the Mortgage Rescue Scheme
• £84 million to provide cavity wall insulation in the social sector
• £21 million for investment in innovative low-carbon heating systems".

In June it goes on "We will take responsibility for an additional £1.5bn channelled into affordable housing over the next two years, following yesterday's announcement on Building Britain's Future by the Prime Minister. The money will be used to build an additional 20,000 new affordable homes on top of the Agency's existing programme.

The funding will be allocated through a number of new and established delivery routes including the HCA's National Affordable Housing Programme (NAHP), and the existing bidding processes to kickstart stalled schemes and for direct development by local authorities.

In July it waffles on "More than 70 key housing and regeneration bodies from across the region joined the HCA on Friday July 10th at the launch of its Regional Investment Strategy. Setting out the Agency's aims for 2009-11.

The strategy highlights the HCA's £1.1 billion regional investment plan to deliver homes that people can afford, in the places they want to live."

August see's the comment "As part of our efforts to help maintain the momentum of house building we are offering smaller sites for sale.

The land for sale includes sites in Lambton Mews, Cambrian Way. The site lies to the south of Cambrian Way on the outskirts of Lambton Village to the south of Washington.

We are also selling our interest in The Royal County of Berkshire Racquets & Health Club Ltd in Bracknell by tender on 10th September 2009.

September we hear "The HCA has received 132 completed submissions from a range of construction and development companies, to the Pre-Qualifying Questionnaire (PQQ) for a panel being set up to develop its sites, which can also be used by Local Authority partners for developing their land."

And..."The HCA has given its backing to New Homes Week and reaffirmed its commitment to helping maintain house builder activity as a route to wider economic recovery. New Homes Week (12-20 September) is run by the Home Builders' Federation (HBF) in conjunction with the New Homes Marketing Board."

Confused?

DITTO - Why is it that am I getting the feeling of 'Exclusive Club' and 'Spin' here?

Regards

MVM

I think BB's point was that high unemployment will mean there simply aren't enough people with enough cash to stimulate demand in the housing market, particularly if it climbs to 3m or 4m as some have predicted.

My worst fear is that the recent resurgence is probably down to a shortage of sellers and a handful of cash-rich buyers looking to snap up bargains.

In other words, we are in a W shaped recession, and we're shortly going to come down on the second downslope of the W.

I don't think the government knows what's it's doing, but it's desperate to get anyone building houses, so it's encouraging developers to build social housing which spares them from the risk of having to sell those units on the private market. We shall see. 

91 Kickstart schemes approved?

£207m will now be allocated to 6,618 new and affordable homes, with £241m available for 5,144 that have conditional approval

The Homes and Communities Agency has approved funding for 91 housing developments under the first wave of the government's £925m Kickstart programme, announced in July.

A further 63 schemes have been approved for the programme, which aims to get stalled residential developments off the ground, subject to "further conditions being met" or "requiring further consideration".

As a result, £207m will now be allocated to directly fund 6,618 new and affordable homes. A further £241m could be allocated to another 5,144 homes, if the 63 conditionally approved schemes get final sign-off.

That means there remains about £500m of government funding for the next round of Kickstart. The HCA confirmed that it has now received over 660 bids for funding under this second round. These schemes, which could unlock up to 55,000 homes, will now be subject to the same level of scrutiny as the successful schemes under round one.

I may get some work before I die after all?

Regards

MVM

Construction will start on a third fewer social homes next year, in a vivid sign of wider impending restraints on government spending.

The news comes as the country's new property quango reveals that the value of its development assets has plunged £1.1bn as a result of the housing crash.

Gordon Brown made social housing one of the government's main priorities in June when he announced an extra £1.5bn for new homes. The flagship promise meant shifting funding from various other departments including transport, health, education and the Home Office.

But this financial fillip will only have a temporary impact, according to targets set by the Homes and Communities Agency, the property quango.

Overall completions will continue to rise from a total of 55,625 this year to 61,500 next year, partly as a result of the government's injection of money. But housing starts will drop away next year, suggesting that there will be fewer completions in the coming years.

Only 29,900 grant-funded housing starts are scheduled for 2010-11, a drop of 34 per cent from the 45,500 target for the current financial year. Of those, the number of "social rented" homes built under the National Affordable Housing programme will halve from 30,389 in 2008-09 to 14,500 next year.

Ministers face an uphill struggle because each unit of social housing now requires a much larger government grant than before the credit crunch.

For the three years to 2011, the social house building target has fallen to 116,576 from 156,000 before the property crash. As a result it will be much harder for Mr Brown to highlight social housing in next month's pre-Budget report without shearing funding once again from other departments.

The news comes as the HCA today (10th November) reveals that the value of its development assets has fallen from £1.9bn to under £800m.

The agency owns vast brownfield sites around the country which rose rapidly in value during the boom but are now worth only a fraction of their previous value. The drop includes an impairment charge of £540m and a £600m reversal of gains made during the rising market.

The quango said this was an accounting write-down that would not affect its ability to build new homes. However, it admitted that the drop in proceeds from the sale of land and buildings - down to £51m last year compared with £333m the previous year - could have an impact.

The HCA will say in its annual report today that it has completed 53,000 new homes in the past year, which saw its creation from the merger of the old English Partnerships and Housing Corporation quangos. Bob Kerslake, chief executive, will say the group has spent £3.9bn through its housing and regeneration programmes. Circumstances have been "particularly challenging" for the entire housing market, he is to say, but the HCA has "maintained the momentum" of its programmes.

The agency will also write off £13m after the insolvency of a private developer with which it was working - now why doesn't any of this surprise me??