The outlook for the 2024 UK housing market is optimistic. Recent data says so, but even without it, experts are encouraged for the changes set to occur in the last half of the year. Inflation reached the target of 2.0% in May, and reported this week it remained so in June. Lenders encouraged by a sooner rather than later cut to the standard base interest rate by the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) have already begun to cut their own interest rate offers. Home buyers are showing up online to shop for properties, hopeful home movers encouraged by the demand from buyers and their own ability to purchase are listing their properties, and first-time home buyers are hopeful new schemes and lower interest rates will allow them to climb onto the property ladder.

It would not be surprising to ask a homeowner or a home buyer that has put off getting a remortgage or mortgaging for a property as to why and discover they are waiting on the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) to make the first rate cut since March 2020. Finally, the inflation rate reached the Bank’s set target of 2% last month, which was the report released in June concerning the state of inflation in May. With inflation at target, it would be expected the MPC would be nearing a decision to cut the standard base interest rate of 5.25%. Borrowers did not need to wait, for lenders were so optimistic a rate cut was nearing they began offering interest rate offers as if the MPC had already met, voted, and cut the base rate. Lenders might have been a bit too optimistic, and home buyers and homeowners might be putting off borrowing longer, because the expectation of a rate cut next month has lessened.

For homeowners, there might be confusion as to why there is so much talk about remortgaging. The confusion could be due to misunderstandings about what a remortgage is and what it can do. During specific economic situations, a remortgage could save a homeowner money when there are lower interest rates to be found. When the homeowner is coming to the expiration of their current mortgage term, a remortgage could offer the ability to secure a lower interest rate, a longer term, or even a fixed rate to lock in a rate and offer peace of mind.

First time home buyers are often so elated at the point when they formally become homeowners, they don’t consider what is ahead of them. The stress is behind them, they no longer have to face rising rental costs, they have finally made it onto the property ladder and all is good. However, there remains as much of a need to create smart savings strategies and to stay aware financially as before when they were yet to own property. 

For the first time in two years, members of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) are anticipating house prices will increase in the near term. Since 2022, hopeful home buyers have been battling financial strains that were creating barriers to becoming a homeowner. Higher house prices that have remained elevated since the pandemic lifestyle buying boom, increased interest rates due to double digit inflation, and a lack of supply in starter homes coming onto the housing market have combined to make buying difficult. The subdued market has experienced house price increases and growth, but not to the level of the one expected.

Affordability and the lack of supply of properties in the housing market are being blamed for the housing market sitting idle. The expected spring bounce failed to materialize as summer came and home buyers remained disinterested either due to the inability to buy or because they were waiting out for better borrowing opportunities and more affordable homes coming to the market. Sellers are still putting homes on the market at higher prices because they can get it. No one is faulting the sellers, but buyers are having to be creative in their dream home shopping.