(Reuters) – British homebuilder Persimmon Plc reported higher half-year revenue on Thursday and said it expected housing demand to remain robust beyond a tax holiday, as customers sought bigger homes after saving more during the lockdowns.
Government incentives such as the tax break, which ends in September, and a mortgage guarantee scheme, along with increasing customer preferences for spacious properties better suited to remote working, have helped homebuilders forecast higher returns for the medium term.
“Customer demand for our new homes has been strong right across the UK with healthy sales reservation rates through the period,” Chief Executive Officer Dean Finch said in a statement.
The country’s second-largest homebuilder, which offers a range of homes from studio apartments to five-bedroom houses, said it expected to operate on around 300 sales outlets on average throughout the year.
The FTSE 100 company said the average selling price of new homes forward sold to owner occupiers was about 250,350 pounds, 3.3% higher than 242,400 pounds a year earlier, while forward sales stood at 1.82 billion pounds ($2.51 billion), as of June-end.
York-based Persimmon said revenue for the six months ended June 30 came in at 1.84 billion pounds, compared with 1.19 billion pounds a year earlier.
British house prices rose by 13.4% in June compared with the same month last year, the biggest annual increase since November 2004, according to mortgage lender Nationwide.
($1 = 0.7255 pound)
(Reporting by Aby Jose Koilparambil in Bengaluru; Editing by Subhranshu Sahu)
