Raeside Chisholm Solicitors Blog

Paul Denton, who is the Chief Executive of Scottish Building Society has called for urgent action to help get young people on the property ladder. He has warned that the impact of Corona Virus could prove a barrier to a whole generation of buyers getting keys to their first home.

House moves are being warned to watch out for scams which could involve their identity and large sums of money being stolen. There have been recent articles in the national press of several cases of emails from solicitors being intercepted and replaced with new messages containing payment details of fraudster’s Accounts.

A “rollercoaster year” for the property market ended in a boom for us here in Scotland, as house prices have increased at a faster rate than any other part of the UK since lockdown began.  Data shows that average house prices in Scotland rose by 6.8% between March and September – in England the rise over the same period was 4.9%, in Wales 1.9% and in Northern Ireland 1.6%.

The coronavirus pandemic is having a major impact on the economy and labour market, with many businesses making redundancies to protect their long-term survival. Employers may feel under pressure to make quick decisions at this time, meaning they could fail to comply with their legal obligations during the redundancy process. As such, it is especially important that workers are aware of their redundancy rights.

The figures provided by the Office for National Statistics show that the average UK house price climbed by 4.7% in the year to the end of September, hitting a record high.  It is believed that pent up demand and the LBTT relief (Stamp Duty in England) are likely to be among factors that have driven up the increase in typical values.