Should you wait to buy your first home in Northampton or buy now? What sort of mortgages are available? What sort of deposit is required? These are questions all Northampton buyers are asking at the moment, yet this week I would like to focus on Northampton first time buyers and what it means directly and indirectly to Northampton homeowners looking to move up the Northampton property ladder and Northampton buy to let landlords. Well quite frankly, to answer that question it’s contingent on what Northampton property you are looking to move into and even more significantly, how long you are ho ..read more

Despite Government regulations that have been in place since the 26 March 2020, where face-to-face viewings were made illegal, Northampton buy to let landlords have during that time been chomping at the bit to build their property empire by looking at buying additional properties for their Northampton buy to let portfolio. There are plenty of investors who think nothing of legally committing to buying a property ‘off plan’ before it’s built – yet over the last few weeks, it has become the norm in the second-hand Northampton property market and they have now stolen a march and bagged some ..read more

Before the Covid-19 pandemic hit, 8,670 Northampton people worked mainly from home, or about 8% of Northampton’s 108,311 workforce (compared to the national average of 14.9%). Yet over the last few weeks many thousands more Northampton workers have joined them in their spare rooms or at their kitchen or dining room tables. Amongst warnings from the Government that some lockdown constraints could stay in place into 2021, businesses are dealing with an unexpected cultural shift in how many of us do our work. Talking to many Northampton people who have been asked to work from home, for many it h ..read more

So now we are only a matter of a couple of weeks into lockdown, yet can you believe it I am still speaking with agents from all over the UK, and I do not jest, properties are still being sold and let even in these unprecedented times. Yet I would like to address the question I have been asked many times recently “What will be the effect of Covid-19 on the Northampton property market in the short, medium and long term?” These are obviously unchartered times, yet we can look back in history to give us clues and more recently, the bounce back that is happening in China (and their property market ..read more

The last five to six weeks, unquestionably, have been one of the most life-changing times we have seen since WW2. The imminent threat of the Coronavirus has taken over the world, the UK and Northampton and will challenge you, our families, our relationships and test us all. The drive of this worldwide action of social distancing is not just to stop you from getting ill with the virus; the bigger drive is to slow down the development of this virus so the NHS will not become overwhelmed with those who are most likely to need hospital care. Yet the issue of social distancing has certainly raised ..read more

This week we are getting back to showing you those Friday investment deals. There are definitely good deals to be had at the moment. This well presented studio apartment is a good investment or first time buyer opportunity that has outdoor garden space and benefits from allocated parking and is on the market for just £84,000 with Northwood. The location makes this great for those who are looking for an investment with a potential rental of £525 giving a 7.5% yield. It is within the green space of Upton Country Park, Sixfields Leisure and gives easy access to the A45 ringroad and M1 15a ..read more

Even though the new legislation was placed on hold because of the recent General Election, it is expected the Government will start fining around half of all UK local authorities for failing to build enough new homes as Westminster starts to force local authorities to build more homes with the new laws. The Conservative Government has gone on record with an ambition to build 300,000 new homes each year from the mid-2020s (aspiring as the average for the last 13 years has only been 177,000 pa). So Downing Street see the planning system as requiring root and branch change to ensure local auth ..read more

If you are buying a home in England costing more than £125,000, you will have to pay Stamp Duty Land Tax on the purchase of your new home. In the provinces, it’s called something slightly different, so if you are buying a property in Scotland over £145,000 you will pay Land and Buildings Transaction Tax (LBTT) and for any property over £180,000 in Wales you will pay Land Transaction Tax (LTT). Whatever the tax is called, it is an important factor when moving, when you consider that Last year the average UK house buyer paid £10,150 in Stamp Duty Tax alone. Now as soon as the date for Rish ..read more

Washing Machine Energy Ratings for Houses was the phrase one Northampton landlord told me a few years ago when we were talking about the colour bar chart graphs that every property has had for over 10 years now. Now these weren’t brought in to use the whole palate of ink in people’s printers, but to increase the energy efficiency of the UK’s housing stock.  The vast majority of Northampton landlords are, by now, acquainted with the legislation that came into force on the 1st of April 2018, that means all new and renewed private tenancy agreements must have an Energy Performance Certificate (EP ..read more

Well, with the General Election just over the horizon and having been asked by a number of Northampton homeowners and Northampton buy to let landlords what the different main parties would do to the local property market, in this week’s article we focus on Labour’s contentious Right to Buy proposal for private tenants. Launched in September, the plan was designed to force landlords to sell their buy to let investments to their tenants who wished to buy them…. at a substantial discount. Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell told the FT in September that, under a new Labour government, tenants wou ..read more