The volume of housing transactions in Scotland is slowly increasing. Figures issued by the Registers of Scotland show that in the quarter April to June there was an increase of 8.1% in the number of transactions. The statistics do show however that not every part of the country showing this buoyancy – in fact the strongest performances came in Aberdeen,Edinburgh, Glasgow and generally areas near the cities. Interestingly the statistics also show no overall increase in prices, in fact a modest dip of 0.3% was recorded. Again there were regional variations with many areas actually still showing price falls of several percentage points. At the same time the Halifax has issued data showing that the number of first time buyers coming into the market throughout the UK is at the highest level since 2007. All of this must encourage buyers and sellers alike. David Borrowman of Caesar and Howie believes the market is now at last on the mend. “We have had a pretty depressed housing market for five years or so. But these figures show a return to better times which I believe will be sustained – particularly if the Scottish Government were to move on a couple of issues. I do think the Scottish Government could do buyers and sellers a favour by scrapping Home Reports after the forthcoming review in December. Also the Scottish Government has not yet indicated it is introducing a mortgage guarantee scheme similar to the one being introduced in England and Wales from January next year. The UK government is a bit ahead of us I think having got rid off Home Information Packs and introducing a mortgage guarantee scheme. If Scotland were to follow suit then we could again have a really healthy house market up here”.
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