Insurance News Archive
Buy to let insurance: Budget 'will not save UK property market'
Posted by Jonathan Walker
The government's Emergency Budget, announced by chancellor George Osborne on Tuesday, will do nothing to prevent residential property prices in the UK from falling, an expert has said.
Although the industry has welcomed a lower than expected increase in capital gains tax, Yolande Barnes, head of residential research at the Savills letting agency, has voiced other concerns.
Speaking to global news service PropertyWire, she warned that the Budget simply reinforced the firm's prognosis that the UK housing market will see a second dip in values over the next two years.
She said: "We anticipated as long ago as the summer of 2009 that the housing market would see further falls in 2010. The chancellor today outlined some of the forces and factors behind this prognosis and gave us no reason to revise our views."
Ms Barnes added that "the pain" will be felt by "just about every household" in Britain, which could run the risk of curbing consumer confidence, the website reported.
Before the Budget was announced, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors revealed that 72 per cent of its members believed that a tax hike would deter new investors from entering the private rented sector.
23 Jun 2010
