The builder is targeting entry-level buyers at a time when foreclosures continue to hold prices down. It is a subject which splits opinion on a daily, weekly and monthly basis - the housing market. The sector is pored over in minute detail, with many lenders, bodies and other organisations publishing figures at the end of each month, detailing average house prices, annual changes, monthly changes, regional breakdowns, discrepancies between asking and selling prices, and so on.
This, in part, has been caused by a lack of supply, but should not take away from the fact that the proportion of surveyors reporting price increases is at its highest point since May 2007 - well before the outset of the credit crisis.
The market fits our culture. This company won’t make a ton of money on its affordable homes, and the profit it does generate requires “managing the daylights out of the business” by keeping operational overhead as low as possible. “When I look at the Builder 100 list every year, I don’t see any company that’s generating the dollars per employee that we do.”
It is difficult to ascertain just how accurate or reliable these surveys - and there are a great many - actually are. Most are released by groups or organisations that have a vested interest in the value of property going up. One of the more reliable reports comes from the Land Registry, which bases its figures on the prices houses are actually sold for, not what they are deemed to be worth by the owners or agents. After all, a house is only worth what somebody is willing to pay for it.
That being said, there does seem to be evidence that an appetite for entering the housing market is returning. Reporting its figures for September, the National Association of Estate Agents said that the average number of house hunters registered at its agents had jumped from 238 to 294 in the month. Furthermore, a survey has found that it is cheaper to buy a home in the UK than it is to rent in all regions apart from London, although this assumes that first time buyers have sizable deposits in place.
What is certain is that at the end of September, there were more mortgage products to choose from than there have been for almost a year, with a shade over 1,400 on the market. There are still just a handful of products that offer buyers a loan worth the total value of the property, or even 95 per cent, but the 90 per cent loan-to-value market is now comprised of more than 100 products, which has not been the case for most of 2009.
A number of new trackers have also been launched by providers and, with some predicting that the base rate of interest will remain low for some years to come, the more daring of potential homeowners have a number of competitive deals to choose from. In contrast, during the 12 months ended June 2009, Orlando’s housing starts fell 51.2% to 7,306 units, and its closings were off 42% to 11,812, according to a quarterly report from the market research firm Metrostudy. By the end of June the market had a 7.1-month supply of single-family inventory (including homes under construction and models), and a jaw-dropping 45,350 vacant developed lots, equal to a 74.5-month supply.