67.7% of Harlow Properties have 3 or more bedrooms – Problem or Opportunity?

The orthodox way of classifying property in the UK is to look at the number of bedrooms rather than its size in square metres (although now we are leaving the EU – I wonder if we can go back to feet and inches?). It seems that homeowners and tenants are happy to pay for more space. It’s quite obvious, the more bedrooms a house or apartment has, the bigger it is likely to be. The reason being not only the actual additional bedroom space, but the properties with more bedrooms tend to have larger / more reception (living) rooms. However, if you think about it, this isn’t so astonishing given that properties with more bedrooms would typically accommodate more people and therefore require larger reception rooms.

In today’s Harlow property market, the Harlow homeowners and Harlow landlords I talk to are always asking me which attributes and features are likely

to make their property comparatively more attractive and which ones may detract from the price. Over time, buyers’ and tenants’ wants and needs have changed. In Harlow, location is still the No. 1 factor affecting the value of property, and a property in the best neighbourhoods, say Churchgate Street or Old Harlow can command a price nearly 50% higher than a similar house in an ‘average’ area. However, after location, the next characteristic that has a significant influence on the desirability, and thus price, of property is the number of bedrooms and the type (i.e. Detached/ Semi/Terraced/Flat).

In previous articles, I have analysed the Harlow housing stock into bedrooms and type of property, but never before now have I cross-referenced type against bedrooms. These figures for the Harlow Council area make fascinating reading. It shows 67.7% of all properties in the area have 3 or more bedrooms

	Detached	Semi-detached	Terraced (including end-terrace)	Flat
1 bedroom	12	27	40	513
2 bedrooms	104	407	2,993	2,113
3 bedrooms	850	2,024	6,194	288
4 bedrooms	901	730	1,290	42
5 or more bedrooms	330	153	236	7

I was genuinely surprised at the low numbers of one and two bed properties, especially 2 bed semis detached houses, especially as tenants like the smaller one and two bed properties in Harlow. You see, it might interest the homeowners and landlords of Harlow, that there has been a change in the numbers of properties on the market and the split in bedrooms on the market over the last 12 months

12 months ago, 25 one bed properties were for sale in Harlow, today 21, a drop of 16%

12 months ago, 41 two bed properties were for sale in Harlow, today 76, a rise of 85%

12 months ago, 85 three bed properties were for sale in Harlow, today 106, a rise of 25%

12 months ago, 75 four bed properties were for sale in Harlow, today 81, a rise of 8%

12 months ago, 45 five + bed properties were for sale in Harlow, today 44, a drop of 2%

It can quite clearly be seen more Harlow properties have become available, which can only be good news for Harlow first time buyers and Harlow buy to let landlords looking for a bargain (especially post Brexit) as property prices have stopped rising at the silly rates they were 12/18 months ago.

  

For several years Harlow buy-to-let investors have been the only buyers at the lower end (starter homes) of the market, as they have been enticed by high tenant demand and attractive returns. Some Harlow landlords believe their window of opportunity has started to close with the new tax regime for landlords, whilst it already appears to be opening wider for first-time buyers. This is great news for first time buyers ... but one final note for Harlow landlords ... all is not lost ... you can still pick up bargains, you just need to be a lot more savvy and do your homework ... one source of such information with articles like this is the Harlow property market Blog