Less than a quarter say it had positive impact
Half of Brits believe that a decade after the vote to leave the EU, Brexit ultimately harmed the UK housing market.
In a survey of 1,000 respondents by Together, more believe Brexit has harmed the UK housing market than it has helped it. Only a quarter (24%) believe that Brexit had a positive impact on the sector, while nearly a third (28%) believe it harmed it a lot and a fifth (22%) believe it harmed the sector a little.
Just under one in 10 (9%) believe Brexit significantly improved the UK housing market and 14% believe it only helped a little.
Negative feelings about the impact of Brexit were stronger in the North, however. Nearly half of Scottish respondents (47%) and more than a third of North East (37%) and North West of England (33%) respondents said Brexit harmed the UK housing market a lot. Meanwhile, only 19% of Londoners and 11% of those in the West Midlands thought it helped boost the UK housing market.
A period of economic uncertainty
Scott Clay, director at property lender Together, said: “Ten years after the Brexit vote, many consumers continue to associate the period with economic uncertainty, and that is often reflected in attitudes towards the housing market.
“While it’s difficult to isolate Brexit from other major events we’ve experienced over the past decade, including the pandemic, inflation surge and rapid increases in interest rates, and, more recently, tensions in Iran cooling buyer confidence – the reality for many households has been higher borrowing costs and greater affordability pressures over the past decade.”
He explained that Brexit impacts, such as new trade barriers, supply chain friction – directly affecting the costs of new builds – and a reduction in EU construction workers had a negative effect on the market.
“These factors, coupled with more recent increases in red tape, may have hampered the viability of many housing developments, with continued weak demand threatening the Government’s target of building 1.5 million homes by 2029. These findings highlight ongoing concerns related to economic stability and raise the issue of reduced consumer confidence and investment hesitancy in the housing sector,” he said.
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