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Welcome to your weekly briefing on important things affecting the housing market.

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This week’s top 5 housing market facts:

1. Nationwide index price slips. Over half of properties in the owner occupier sector are classified as ‘underoccupied’ - https://www.nationwide.co.uk/media/hpi/reports/annual-house-price-growth-softens-in-august-1

2. Budget announced for 26 November heralding 12 weeks of uncertainty. The late timing gives less time for households and businesses to plan for any tax changes scheduled for the new financial year that begins in April. https://x.com/hmtreasury/status/1963158743312474208

3. Poorest households squeezed most by rising inflation, hurting affordability https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-08-28/poorest-households-squeezed-most-by-fresh-surge-in-uk-inflation

4. 20% of agreed deals fall through as property taxes panic from budget uncertainty sweeps the market https://thenegotiator.co.uk/news/uk-housing-market-news/estate-agent-loses-20-of-sales-following-property-tax-panic/

5. Jobs are being cut at fastest rate since pandemic, says Bank of England. In August, the Decision Maker Panel survey asked firms about the margins of adjustment to the changes in employer National insurance contributions (NICs) implemented in April 2025. Firms were allowed to select more than one option. 66% of firms reported lowering profit margins. 34% raising prices. 46% lowering employment. 20% paying lower wages than they otherwise would have done. https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/decision-maker-panel/2025/august-2025

Charlie's Thought of the Week:

“You’ve never had it so bad.” The government prepares to lay waste to the remnants of the housing market.

Prepare for the perfect triple-whammy storm of destructive government intervention in the housing market. A trifecta of tragedies, a perfect storm of legislative errors, economic uncertainty and tax travesties, is just around the corner. And it’s going to hit all 3 generations. Grandparents, parents and adult kids.

Hold on tight.

The primary function of the housing market is to help people find a place to live, so they can get on with the business of living, and for most, raising a family.

The more people who are moving home, and the more certainty there is around the rules and costs of moving home, the more people are able to budget, plan, and move. This is social mobility and that’s at the root of economic growth.

Governments of all parties are generally bureaucratic and weak. They give in to pressure groups, lobbies, unions and public opinion. They almost always stand at elections on fixing the housing market, because that’s almost always the country’s biggest problem.

They then go on to either do nothing, or do things that make it worse.

Bad intervention

There are no exceptions. Every time the government has intervened in the housing market, it has made moving home more difficult and more expensive. That’s a staggering statement to behold, but it’s true. For 50 years, it has got worse and worse. It now takes longer than ever to move home, with great levels of uncertainty, and the highest levels of house prices to salaries in living memory.

(Don’t say it’s improved recently, that’s not true. If tax rises are included, and house prices are measured as a multiple of post-tax income, they are at the highest level in over 100 years.)

Uncertainty over housing and related tax policies always slams the brakes on the market. Sometimes it’s only a few weeks, this time it’s 3 months.

We’re being threatened with Capital Gains Tax on primary residence, annual property taxes, lowered inheritance tax thresholds, lowered VAT thresholds (threatening small businesses everywhere, thus putting their moving plans on hold), just for starters.

There’s no telling just how badly this government could get things wrong at the next budget. They are backed into a corner, into a £50bn fiscal hole of their own making (in just a year!). The money markets are threatening to wreak havoc with bond yields, they are in a desperate situation, mostly of their own making, despite the Tories terrible ten year tenure. (Fourteen years, I know. I couldn’t resist the alliteration).

Bend over

There’s nothing anyone can do about it either, for now. We have to bend over and take it up the jacksy, like good, obedient, taxpaying worklings.

Boomers, who have already had the value of their life savings “inflated away” like mortgage debt, are also discovering how much their homes aren’t worth anymore. And no matter how much people think they had it lucky, it’s still brutal to have it taken away like this. And that’s before we find out if they’re going to break the pension triple lock, slap CGT and annual property tax on big homes, leaving them with little or nothing to pay for later life care, or to leave to their Gen X kids. Even if they do have anything left over, inheritance tax will take most of it.

Gen X’ers had a better childhood than the boomers (being a kid in the 70s and 80s was wild fun), but raising families has been much harder and more expensive for them than it was for the Boomers.

Millennials are now the majority of First Time Buyers and it’s never been harder to get into an owned home. And many of them who bought new builds 5 years ago, are finding out to their horror just how much house prices don’t always go up, especially with flats, and extra-specially so with HTB in London.

And that’s before we even get started on the holy clusterf*ck that is the Renters Rights Bill, coming just around the corner. A well-intentioned, much-needed but poorly executed car crash of legislation, which looks like it also might herald rent-controls in some form or other soon afterwards, the final nail in the coffin of a functioning rental housing stock.

What can be done?

What advice would I give my family?

Boomers: You’re between a rock and a hard place. A big, hard-to-heat empty nest, that you’d love to downsize from, free up some equity and help the kids along their housing journey, but Stamp Duty and the looming CGT are making it look like that’s going to be harder than ever. If you are selling up, choose your agent like your (and your family’s) future depends on it, because it does. And find a low-maintenance, highly efficient home to hunker down in for the coming storm.

Gen X’ers. If you’re in your forever home already, tighten your belt, invest in long-term improvements to energy efficiency, and factor in rising maintenance costs. If you’re upsizing, you’re in the fortunate few, but choose carefully where you end up. You don’t want a huge home that turns into a millstone around your neck, as many Boomers have found to their cost. If you’re still in rented with a view to buying at some point in the future, time is on your side. If you’re in the middle of moving and you’ve found your forever home, I wouldn’t delay. It’s the move, not the money, remember. Just get into the home you want to be in forever as soon as you can. Because whatever happens, if you have a happy home, you can weather any storm.

Millennials: If you’re renting and saving, keep going, I think things are moving in your favour, despite the government’s attempts to pump prices by relaxing lending rules. If you’re buying and you’re absolutely sure about the place you’re moving into, go for it. If you have any doubts, listen to them. If it’s not a “hell yes” then it should be a no. Renting is annoying, but it is at least flexible.

Gen Z’ers: you guys have been severely let down on many fronts! It’s not supposed to be this hard. But if you want it enough, and you have the financial discipline to live within means while saving for a home, there are still places you can get one within reach of ordinary salary multiples, less so in the South and East.

The enemies.

Remember, home movers, you have 3 enemies to combat when it comes to housing yourselves and your families:

1. Government policy and intervention. They need to just leave the housing market alone and build social homes in vast numbers. And stop taking bribes from housebuilders.

2. Banks and lenders: The price-pumping gonzi pushers who never cease to sell the dream of debt, are behind the relentless messaging that you can’t go wrong with housing. It’s not true. Disregard their guff.

3. The moving industry of terrible agents, bad conveyancers and mediocre mortgage advisers, will all take a chunk out of your wealth if you let them. Take control, choose carefully.

Sorry for the armageddon-like thought of the week, but that’s what’s in my head this week, so that’s what you get!

Have a great weekend, if you still can. The sun will come up tomorrow.

Charlie

In case you missed anything this week…

Is the destruction of the UK economy deliberate or incompetence? Charlie and Stiggy chat.

Live: Building Surveyor Q&A

Most viewed post this week on X:

Most viewed video this week on TikTok:

@movinghomewithcharlie

The Buyer's Psychology REVEALED!

That’s all for this week!

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Have a great weekend, lots of love and luck to you all.

Charlie