New data has suggested that the time taken for a transaction to complete fell considerably in July to the lowest level seen in the last 12 months.
Data agency TwentyCi reported that the time taken from the sale of a property to completion is now 17 weeks, with the average time taken for a homeowner to move into a new property having put it up for sale now sitting at 20 weeks.
A 17-week wait represents a 13% fall month-on-month, and it has also been suggested that August will maintain the fall. A chart containing the average (mean) time to progress for the last twelve months is below:
Specifically, the time to progress in July was 123 days, the equivalent of 17.6 weeks or four months.
It must be noted that this remains a full month longer than pre-pandemic levels, though the 20-week wait from listing to completion is just two weeks longer than the pre-pandemic figure of 18 weeks.
This is largely down to the sharp drop in the time taken for a property to sell having been listed on the market since prior to the pandemic. Median total time on the market is now 19 days, compared to 37 days in July 2019.
Colin Bradshaw, Managing Director, TwentyCi commented:
“As the availability of stock improves allowing chains to form sooner, the speed of obtaining keys to a newly purchased property has accelerated for UK homemovers.”
