Saving for a deposit, regardless of whether you’re buying with a partner, by yourself or with a friend, is going to take most people a long time. According to our Property Insights report, 37 per cent of renters say the amount needed for a deposit is one of the biggest barriers to homeownership. In some ways, this isn’t surprising when over the last five years, we’ve had a cost-of-living crisis, rising energy costs, high inflation and market uncertainty. These events have left many younger would-be-homeowners struggling to get their foot on the property ladder.

I don’t think we will ever be able to get away entirely from the Bank of Mum and Dad. Our latest report found that almost six in 10 renters believe that it’s just impossible to buy a home without an inheritance or loan from a family member, and there's always a part of the market that looks to family for support.  However, the picture isn’t as bleak as it suggests: just 18 per cent of recent first-time buyers received financial help from family.

At Barclays, we’ve launched products to increase opportunities for first-time-buyers who have support from their family members to speed up to journey to owning their own home. Our Springboard Mortgage and Mortgage Boost continue to be popular and we’re working hard to make sure those products are helping the customers they were created to help. 

Property Insights data shows lots of people are looking to move house in 2025. In fact, as many as one in six existing homeowners (16%) are planning to relocate this year and over one in five current renters (22%) are firmly of the belief that home ownership is within their reach within the next five years.

These figures are heartening, and they’re backed up by what we’re seeing in our metrics. When we’re assessing the state of the property market, we have a number of key indicators. The one I look to on a weekly basis is the number of illustrations. An illustration is a document you’ll be given when you go to a lender to see what you can borrow. So, if there are lots of illustrations getting drawn up, then there are lots of people looking to move in the coming months.

Comparing the pre-Christmas period to the new year, we’ve seen those numbers increase by about 20 per cent. That’s a very positive sign, and something to build on as the year progresses.

Whilst house building dominates many of the news headlines, for the property market to speed up, there has to be demand as well as supply. It’s encouraging that today’s renters still aspire to be tomorrow’s homeowners, despite facing challenges.

The Government has been clear that it wants to build 1.5 million homes, which is 300,000 per year, and that they’re prepared to have the tough conversations with planners and local councils to get it done.

We look forward to the forthcoming housing strategy to provide further policy certainty for the private sector on the government's long-term approach for housing.

At Barclays we've identified that there are a range of solutions which could supercharge the housing market in 2025. For example, our report on rightsizing found that public policy could help free up existing spare capacity in the housing market – we estimate as many as 3.8 million homes. 

At the beginning of the month, the Bank of England lowered interest rates to 4.5 per cent, that’s the lowest level we’ve seen for more than 18 months and the second rate cut in four months. As well as this, the  FCA has set out that it is looking to simplifying lending and advice rules for mortgages.

Taken together, these are both positive signs for the property market in the year to come.  If these pieces all fall into place, I think we could see a huge confidence boost for the market in 2025.