by Robert Jones. Director, Property Investments UK

15th April 2020

The world is in shock.

The coronavirus epidemic is having a wide-reaching impact on our physical and mental health and is something, the-likes-of-which, we haven't experienced in a century. The financial impact will also be far-reaching. Even with government stimulus, the situation we see before us is wholly unpredictable and every one of us will be impacted.

This article is written on 15th April 2020. It isn’t going to be dark, downbeat or gloomy. Quiet the opposite. What we want to do is to help you cut through conjecture and opinion and find the data you'll need to navigate the UK property market, throughout the year.

We will aim to distil insights we've gleaned from various conversations we've had, since the beginning of the lockdown, with stakeholders throughout the industry; from mortgage brokers to developers; new build home builders to estate agents; auction companies to surveyors; buyers to sellers.

And from those conversations, at different levels of the industry, we have perhaps learned a few things about how other companies - other people - are working through the current situation; where they are being risk-aversed and where they are seeing positivity.

Combining this information with our market data sources has given us a few insights into what we all could expect for the rest of 2020. And we're sharing, in the hope that it might be useful to anyone who needs to think carefully about what the lockdown could mean for national and local housing markets over the medium-term.

But of course, even a good combination of reference points, in the right context and timeframe can't help predict everything that's coming our way. News and updates are coming daily. So, while it is essential to try and predict and make plans, it is equally essential to stay open to the idea of change and be ready to adapt.

With that in mind, let's have look at what could happen for the rest of the year, starting with next couple of months and what remains of spring, April and May.