Housing trends move in right direction but remain well above affordable levels

Thursday 22 August 2024

Early positive signs on housing pressures have been welcomed but there is still a long way to go, Environment President Deputy Lindsay de Sausmarez has said after the committee updated progress on its action plan.

It has published its first annual update report on the Guernsey Housing Plan.

The plan was published in July 2023 to address Guernsey’s significant housing pressures, with the aim that “all people living in Guernsey will have access to a range of good quality housing that is affordable, secure, energy efficient and adequate for their needs".

The average property price has fallen from £647,889 in Q3 2023 to £587,673 in Q2 2024, a decrease of 9.29% in nominal terms and a decrease of 11.61% in real terms, when inflation over the period is taken into account.

The overall average purchase price to earnings ratio has fallen from 16.3 when the Guernsey Housing Plan was first published. 

Mix-adjusted, it was 15.4 in Q2 2022; using the same methodology it was 14.5 mix-adjusted in Q2 2024, reflecting increased affordability, partly due to an increase in earnings relative to house prices. 

Average rents have also decreased in real terms by nearly 4% over that period. 

“However, although these trends are moving in a direction that makes housing more affordable to more people, these averages are still well above the levels considered sustainably affordable, so this continues to be a focus of work in the Guernsey Housing Plan,” E&I said.

Included within the annual report are updates on the Affordable Housing Development Programme, housing standards legislation and the Open Market inscriptions policy. 

The update also provides more detail on stimulating private market housing developments, investigating modern methods of construction, a long-term key worker housing policy and efforts to regulate the private rental market.

Deputy de Sausmarez said: “When we initially launched the plan, we explained that there was no silver bullet to Guernsey’s housing pressures, but through this comprehensive plan, covering cross- committee work, we are seeing some early positive signs.

“However, there’s still a long way to go and we’re not resting on our laurels.

“A lot of work has been undertaken in the past year, and even more is planned for the next year, with a number of work-streams due to report in the next few months.

“Our efforts are very much focused on trying to alleviate Guernsey’s various housing pressures, and it’s good to see some early positive signs.”