11-year high for property market

Friday 05 October 2018

The latest house sale figures suggest the property marker has reached an 11-year high in recent months.

Carey Olsen said the quarterly sales activity in the Guernsey Local Market showed that there were 257 Local Market houses and flats sold between 1 July and 30 September this year.

That's the highest since the fourth quarter of 2007 when 287 Local Market properties were sold. It brings the total number of Local Market transactions for this year to 598 – an increase of eight on the same time last year. 

The latest conveyancing statistics were compiled by Unusualities of Guernsey, an independent compiler of local conveyancing statistics.

Jason Morgan, head of Carey Olsen's property group in Guernsey, said: "While the quarterly activity in the Local Market is the highest we have seen since 2007, we are still some way short of the pre-financial crisis period before 2008 for the year as a whole. We should also bear in mind that the quarter before this one was itself 10% down on the second quarter of last year, so there is still some way to go before we can say with confidence that this is the beginning of an upward trend."

For the Guernsey Open Market, Unusualities of Guernsey recorded 49 transactions in the first nine months of 2018, compared to 27 for the same period last year. Of those 49 sales, the median price (realty only) of the 47 Open Market houses sold was £1,072,500, up from the £835,000 for the same period last year.

The two Open Market flats sold in 2018 have a median price (realty only) of £1,023,750.*

Mr Morgan added: "Continued interest in the Open Market is both encouraging and reassuring and shows that Guernsey is proving very attractive to new residents."

*None of the total sales numbers quoted include inter-family or inter-company sales, transactions which are typically priced at £1.

Pictured: Mr Morgan.