Housing drivers
* Spring seems to have come early for the UK housing market. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors’ survey reported a sharp rise in new buyer enquiries and house price expectations in January. New instructions for house sales are rising at the fastest pace in over six years. House price inflation has edged up in the last couple of months.
* The recent stirrings follow a period of sluggish housing activity. The rebound in house prices and activity which started in 2013 hit the buffers in 2016, the year of the EU referendum. The Halifax measure of house price inflation dropped from a year-on-year peak of 8.8% in the spring of 2016 to a low of 0.9% last October. House prices in London have grown far slower than the national average in the last three years, a development which has made housing in the capital marginally more affordable relative to incomes.
* Yet over a longer period the picture is of house prices far outstripping general inflation and earnings. Since 2000 the Halifax measure of UK house prices almost tripled while earnings have rose by less than 80%.
* A recent Bank of England working paper argues that the rise in house prices in this period can be largely attributed to the effect of lower interest rates. A lower discount rate raises the present value of an asset, thus raising house prices. (The same process has done wonders for equity prices.) But the relationship works both ways. The model developed by the author of the Bank paper suggests that a sustained increase of 1% in long-term interest rates could lead to a 20% fall in house prices.
* The triple shock of disinflation, credit liberalisation and quantitative easing helped power UK house prices. It is a remarkable combination, but one that seems unlikely to be repeated in the next 20 years.
* Of course housing demand has also risen due to the growth of single person households, immigration and greater longevity; the number of English households has increased by 13% since 2000. Given the deterioration in housing affordability and rising concerns about housing shortages it is, perhaps, surprising that the official data show that the number of dwellings in England has increased at a rather faster rate than the number of households. This is less reassuring than it might seem. There are acute regional housing shortages, evidenced by soaring rents in London. And the quality of the housing stock is hotly debated (UK housing is ageing, prompting LSE academic Paul Preston to declare that houses “are akin to Cuban cars: they are still in use but they are clapped out and polluting”). We will return to the question of housing supply in a future Monday Briefing.
* Looking ahead it seems plausible that the government’s post-Brexit migration policy, coupled with very low unemployment rates in central Europe, will slow the rate of growth of migration. Meanwhile housing supply is picking up from the lows seen in the wake of the financial crisis.
* Sentiment in the housing market has perked up. But the tailwinds which drove a vertiginous rise in prices over recent decades are weakening. The scope for substantial reductions in interest rates has diminished. A period of rapid growth in immigration may be drawing to an end. Expanding housing supply seems, once again, to be a political priority. The double-digit house price inflation of the decade before the financial crisis looks increasingly like another world.
PS: An update on the spread and impact of coronavirus. The head of the World Health Organization expressed concern at the number of coronavirus cases with no obvious link to China or other cases, including relatively small but increasing numbers in Iran and Italy. Italy has the highest number of coronavirus cases in Europe, with 152. Italy has imposed strict quarantine restrictions in two northern regions where about 50,000 people cannot enter or leave several towns for the next two weeks without special permission. South Korea, Japan, Italy, Singapore and Hong Kong account for the highest number of coronavirus cases outside mainland China. South Korea imposed emergency measures on the city of Daegu, as the number of cases in the country rose above 600. The number of infections worldwide rose to almost 79,000 and the number of deaths to 2,467. The average number of new daily cases fell last week, but an earlier change to case-reporting methodology makes the trend difficult to assess with confidence. Over 80% of cases are in China’s Hubei province, and 98% in mainland China. The Chinese government tightened travel restrictions in Hubei, requiring the population of almost 59m to stay at home. In recent weeks daily trips in China by road, rail, air and ship have been running at around 20% of the levels of a year ago. About two-thirds of China’s 300m migrant workers have been unable to return to work following the extended New Year holidays due to travel restrictions and quarantines. Many factories and businesses are operating well below capacity. Apple warned that its global supply of iPhones would be “temporarily constrained” due to the disruption to manufacturing in China. Jaguar Land Rover CEO Ralf Speth said that his company flew parts in suitcases from China to the UK to ensure it did not run out of key components.
OUR REVIEW OF LAST WEEK’S NEWS
The UK FTSE 100 equity index ended the week down 0.1% at 7,404.
Economics and business
* The IHS Markit index of US services and manufacturing activity dropped to six-year low in February as coronavirus disrupted travel, tourism and supply chains
* Minutes of the US Federal Reserve policy meeting indicate the Fed intends to keep interest rates on hold this year
* Bernie Sanders victory in the Nevada caucuses strengthened his position as the leading candidate for the Democratic nomination for November’s presidential election
* Michael Bloomberg made his first appearance in a debate as he enters the contest for the US Democratic nomination
* The EU and the UK accused each other of acting in bad faith as each rejected the others vision for a future trade agreement
* The EU is yet to agree its negotiating mandate for its future relationship with the UK, reportedly due to France pushing for tougher demands
* The EU’s chief negotiator stated a Canada-style trade deal would not be on offer to the UK
* Japan’s economy contracted by 1.6% in the fourth quarter in part due to a new sales tax hitting consumption
* The coronavirus outbreak is likely to have affected activity in Japan in the first quarter this year, raising the risk of a technical recession
* The Chinese central bank cut interest rates in a bid to ease credit conditions for firms
* The UK added 180,000 jobs and wages grew faster than inflation in December, showing the labour market remains resilient
* UK inflation picked up in January, dampening expectations that the Bank of England would cut rates
* UK retail sales rebounded in January, growing by 0.9% year on year
* UK chancellor Rishi Sunak confirmed he intends to proceed with the budget on 11 March following speculation it could be delayed
* UK home secretary Priti Patel announced details of a new points-based immigration system intended to curtail low-skilled immigration
* A US film studio announced it will invest £150m in a new production facility in Reading, UK
* HSBC announced it will reduce its headcount by 35,000 as part of a strategic restructuring
* The UK is investigating the possibility of Chinese involvement in the planned high-speed railway HS2 after the Chinese state railway construction company claimed it could build the railway within five years
* EU budget negotiations are deadlocked as member states disagree over how to fund the shortfall created by the UK’s departure
* Sales at Germany’s largest safe manufacturer are reportedly up by one-third since the ECB imposed negative interest rates
And finally... an Irish drug dealer lost £46m of bitcoin after the fishing-rod case in which he was hiding the codes to his cryptocurrency fortune was taken to the dump by his former landlord. The landlord cleared the property rented by Mr Collins after he was jailed for five years – mis-plaiced