Assetz® News » HOME | RSS Feed FEED | LIST ALL ARTICLES | ASSETZ HOMEPAGE
Investment Property News from Assetz

Assetz® Property News Service

Sipp investors anticipating property purchase

26th July 2005 | back to article listings BACK    print this article PRINT

New research confirms that upcoming changes to pensions rules will have a strong impact upon the property market, with a sizable percentage of investors hoping to use their pensions for property purchase.

As of A Day on April 6th next year, investors will be able to invest up to £215,000 in a self invested personal pension (Sipp) to the purchase of residential or commercial property. As such, Sipp investors will be able to make substantial savings on property purchases, with the government supplementing the shortfall.

A survey conducted by independent financial advisor Hargreaves Lansdown has found that 37 per cent of current SIPP investors are keen to use their pensions to finance new properties. This could mean 52,000 extra pension property transactions, each at an estimated average value of £195,000.

Of all respondents to the survey 85 per cent are planning on buying at home, and 79 per cent are planning on investing in buy to let properties. This would represent a significant boost for the buy to let market, which has proven consistently buoyant in recent months, largely due to sustained confidence among landlords with expanding portfolios. Over 40 per cent of SIPP investors are hoping to use their Sipp to invest in a holiday home, with 32 per cent with their sights set on a foreign property. In total, this would equate to some £8.5 billion of additional funding in the UK housing market with a further £1.5 billion going into overseas properties.

Following next April's changes investors will be eligible to borrow up to 50 per cent of the value of the pension plan to invest in property. In a Mortgage Trust survey earlier this month, 74 per cent of respondents were aware of the new rules, though less than 30 per cent felt "up to speed" on the finer details as to how the changes would be implemented. Over 44 per cent knew that changes of some sort would be taking place, compared to the 25 per cent who knew nothing at all.

Spain has been found to be the most popular destination for overseas Sipp property investments, followed by France.

These figures have been in line with Assetz research into the subject but the fact the Hargreaves Lansdowns data was from a survey of existing SIPP holders they have overall higher levels of awareness of the changes come A Day.

Assetz® is a UK and International Property Investment Specialist. Please visit our property sites shown below.

Assetz for Investors UK Assetz Hotels Assetz Homes Assetz International Assetz France Assetz Spain Assetz Cyprus Assetz Germany Assetz Portugal Assetz Ski Assetz Cape Verde Assetz USA Assetz Finance Assetz Fund Management

Accessing the news service

You can view all of the Assetz® UK, International and UK Property Investment Articles and News here.

We also provide an RSS Feed Feed of the news service, or you can view all articles. Click here to view more information on RSS readers and how they make reading online news more convenient.

eXTReMe Tracker