Boosted by the government’s Help-to-Buy schemes, the number of first-time buyers in Britain rose by 10 per cent in the first half of 2016, compared to the first six months of 2015, according to Halifax’s First-Time Buyer Review.
The largest mortgage lender in the UK revealed that an estimated 154,200 people joined the property ladder between January and June 2016, up from 140,500 for the same period last year. It was also more than double the market-low experienced during the recession in 2009, when just 72,200 people purchased their first home.
Halifax also showed that 47 per cent of the mortgage market for H1 2016 was made up of first-time buyers – in 2011 this figure was 38 per cent.
The average deposit of a first-time buyer for H1 2016 was £33,960, a figure 14 per cent higher than last year, and equivalent to 17 per cent of the purchase price.
The average price paid by first-time buyers rose to £199,414 over the past year, up from £178,399.
“There was a further increase in the number of first-time buyers in the first half of the year with the total exceeding 100,000 in the first six months of each year since 2012,” said Chris Gowland, mortgages director at Halifax.
“This rise has been broadly in line with a general improvement in market activity and is likely to have been helped by government measures including the Help-to-Buy scheme.”
“Although numbers remain below their previous peaks and many potential first-time buyers are facing escalating house prices and deposit sizes, record-low mortgage rates continue to make buying seem a more attractive option than renting.”
