Rush to beat original Stamp Duty holiday deadline fuels uptick in transactions

Andy Sommerville, Director at Search Acumen, comments on the rush to beat original Stamp Duty holiday deadline fuels uptick in transactions.

Andy says:

“These latest figures in part reveal the scale of stimulus the final months of the original Stamp Duty holiday injected into the property market.

“The rise in residential property transactions over the last month has been partly driven by prospective homebuyers rushing to complete transactions before the initial Stamp Duty holiday cut off in March. 

“The extension of the SDLT holiday may not inject the same level of stimulus into the property market than the initial subsidy did. Many consumers have already rushed to make discretionary moves and take advantage of the financial incentives on offer through the holiday, while pent-up demand will be noticeably lower than it was last year due to the gradual reopening of the UK economy.

“However, conveyancers still face immense pressures due to the scale of the backlog of incomplete transactions caused by capacity constraints in the face of enormous demand over the last year. This highlights the urgent need to continue to digitise the property industry – especially at the due diligence stage.

“By providing conveyancers with instant access to property data upfront, we can cut down the current delays and create a more productive process. At the same time, it is time for lenders to accept data rich products that can be delivered instantly, rather than relying on Local Authority Searches which are time consuming and cumbersome to produce. Only then will we be able to help alleviate the volumes of work piling up on lawyers’ desks while enabling their clients to get into homes sooner.”

Kindly shared by Search Acumen

Main photo courtesy of Pixabay