Is now a good time to sell?

Seasonality – the traditional driver of the property market – is much less dominant than it used to be. As the 2025 Autumn Budget delivered its least worst outcome in terms of the High Value Council Tax Surcharge and December brought another welcome interest rate cut, the boost to market sentiment led to a surge in market activity. Exchanges in December were up over 20% on what’s considered normal for the time of year. People who had held off for fear of the unknown, dusted down their plans to move.

Some of the deals so far this year are carryovers from that pent-up, post-budget uptick – but we are seeing fresh interest, too. Interestingly, a number of offers are on properties that have been on the market for a while, suggesting a degree of renewed motivation from buyers who have been watching the market closely, as well as from those who are newly registered.

My advice to would-be sellers remains to go early and not to wait for spring. Lots of instructions that were on ice in the latter part of last year will be coming to the market now and I’m more convinced than ever that this is the best strategy.

Why? Because where seasonality has lost its grip on the market, politics has taken over. I have a feeling that the local elections in May could raise more questions than answers, and lead to more political uncertainty which the market doesn’t need.

More choice for buyers and latent demand for sellers

We’ll see what plays out, but for the moment at least I’m expecting the first five months of 2026 to be our busiest. For buyers there’s more choice than is normal at this time of year and for sellers there’s latent demand, although I’d add that vendors still need to be realistic about prices.

Of course, the market isn’t perfect; the economic outlook hasn’t changed and with it, that word again, uncertainty.

However, we believe the country house market is bottoming out. We’re cautious about price growth but, at the same time, there is a significant north/south divide with the likes of Scotland, Yorkshire and parts of Cheshire, for example, still catching up.

House prices and regional variations

We anticipate that the prime markets furthest from London will see the highest price growth over the next five years. Scotland is set to perform the strongest, while the relatively affordable prime markets of the Midlands, the North of England and Wales are also expected to outperform.

Overall, our research team is forecasting average price growth of 1.5% for prime regional property this year, contributing to five-year projected growth of 17.6%.

Prime central London

In prime central London, values remain some 24% below their 2014 peak and we expect them to experience a further modest drop this year. After that we forecast a gradual improvement, with values increasing by just over 8% over the next five years. There’s real value to be had and there’s underlying demand as well. We saw renewed interest from the US last year and this may well translate into action in 2026. However, the capital, and indeed the UK as a whole, needs to up its PR game in my opinion. Fabulous architecture, history, culture, fine dining and entertainment – it’s a good story to tell.

Further information

Contact Andrew Perratt 

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