Wimpey notes a state of resilience in housing

Britain’s second biggest housebuilder by volume said it expects an improvement in its financial results in the first half, supported by a “stable” market.

If these conditions continue, the group expects to continue posting a better performance period-on-period, with full-year returns in 2012 that are ahead of cost of capital and in line with expectations

Peter Redfern, chief executive, pointed to “a straightforward supply and demand” issue with a shortage in the number of new homes while “a lot of people want to buy a house”.

“A lot of things are stable, albeit stable at a lower level than they were five years ago,” he told the Yorkshire Post.

“There is no lack of demand and mortgage availability is certainly not much better or worse than it was six or 12 months ago.

“If we work hard there are customers out there who like our houses and want to buy them.”

Taylor Wimpey helps customers through shared equity and mortgage guarantee schemes, Mr Redfern said.

Asked about regional discrepancies, he said: “There’s a lot of talk about the North-South divide at the moment. It was ever thus, to a degree.

“But we tend to view it as less stark than some of our competitors and market commentators.

“Most market commentators live in London and are very London-centric.

“Our business is national. We sell houses everywhere from Cornwall to Aberdeen. As you go further north and south west, there are more areas where economic conditions are more uncertain than the South East.

“But there are also areas in Yorkshire and further in the North East where there are reasonably strong and stable housing markets.

“As long as we pick our locations right and get our prices right we do well in Yorkshire. But there are parts of the market that are still challenged.”

Taylor Wimpey has 14 sites in Yorkshire at locations including Leeds, Sheffield, Wakefield and Bradford.

The group plans to open nine new developments in the region in 2012, from two-bed apartments to four-bed detached homes.

The group completed 5,083 homes in the six months ending July 1, up from 4,707 in the first half of 2011, with the overall average selling price of the completions increasing to £175,000 from £168,000.

York-based Persimmon, Britain’s biggest housebuilder by market value, on Tuesday said it had made an excellent start to its new strategic plan, completing 4,712 new homes in the first six months of 2012, a six per cent increase year-on-year.

It said market conditions had been relatively stable although sentiment in the UK housing market continued to be affected by weakness in the country’s economy.

Asked about the outlook for the UK economy over the next two to three years, Mr Redfern said: “The most likely thing is more of the same. We don’t expect the market to suddenly recover and shrug off the concerns of the last three or four years and say everything is fine again. We expect that to be fairly long.

“We think there is inherent stability in our market and generally in the UK economy.

“As long as we can get through the crisis in Europe without anything major thing going wrong then gradual recovery will set in.”

Taylor Wimpey, which has 100 employees in Yorkshire, excluding contractors, reports full-year results on August 1.

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