The government’s decision to introduce new tier 4 restrictions for London, the south-east and east of England, amid a surge in Covid-19 cases and growing concern about a new strain of coronavirus spreading rapidly in the region, has left many people feeling disappointed as their Christmas plans are thrown into disarray.

Buy-to-let sales boom as landlords rush to benefit from stamp duty holiday.

Surging activity has seen house prices rise by 6.5% in November, the highest rate of growth since January 2015, Nationwide’s House Price Index has revealed.

One in five individual and multi-property landlords felt unprepared when they first started letting properties, research by Direct Line – Business found.

There were 1,464 repossessions in the North West in the past 12 months, the most of any region, research from home buying platform Yes Homebuyers has found.

The stamp duty holiday, which came into immediate effect in July as part of the Chancellor’s summer economic update, has helped to sustain the property market’s boom after the first lockdown – and is expected to keep momentum up over the next few months until it comes to a close on March 31, 2021.

The housing market in England and Wales is displaying signs of stabilising, according to analysis of web traffic from property advice website Property Price Advice.

Valuation requests on the website have broadly returned to their four-year average, representing a significant fall from the immediate post-lockdown spike.

Property rebound predicted to continue as buyers rush to complete before stamp duty holiday ends. More than 100,000 additional house sales are expected during the first three months of 2021, as the rebound in the property market continues and buyers rush to complete their purchases before the end of the stamp duty holiday. The number of new sales being agreed remains 38% higher than it was a year ago, according to property website Zoopla. It predicts the housing market will be the busiest before Christmas then it has been for over a decade.