New research from Yopa has found that first-time buyer demand has fallen across several major British cities, with Nottingham showing the steepest decline since the beginning of the year.
Yopa analysed first-time buyer demand based on the proportion of homes listed under buying schemes that have sold subject to contract compared with total available stock.
The findings show that only 1.8% of homes currently for sale qualify under such schemes. Across Britain, just 32.3% of first-time buyer homes found a buyer in Q3, compared with 34% in Q1, a fall of 1.7%.
Bristol, Liverpool and Leeds currently top the rankings for first-time buyer demand at 51.6%, 44.3% and 42.5% respectively, though all three have cooled since the start of the year.
Nottingham recorded the biggest drop, with demand falling from 65.5% to 26.7%, a decrease of 38.8%.
Other notable declines were seen in Cardiff (-28.5%), Edinburgh (-28%), Newcastle (-23.7%), Liverpool (-19.2%), Leeds (-16.4%) and Sheffield (-13.6%).
Some cities bucked the trend. Leicester saw the strongest increase in demand, rising from 39.7% to 45.3% (+5.7%), while Bournemouth (+2.1%) and Birmingham (+1.6%) also posted modest gains.
Verona Frankish, CEO of Yopa, said: “Stronger wage growth and improvements to both the range and affordability of mortgage products in recent months have both helped to boost the ability of first-time buyers when it comes to climbing the property ladder.
“However, the high cost of homeownership remains a significant barrier and, since the start of the year, first-time buyer demand levels have fallen across all but a handful of major cities.
“Should the Government introduce a stamp duty shake-up in the upcoming Autumn Budget, it would help to significantly boost first-time buyer activity.
“Unfortunately, this is likely to be wishful thinking, but at the very least, we need to see more homes become available with the added boost of a buying scheme in order to help stimulate the market.”
