The year in review
A read of all of this year's reports.
In 2021 Rightmove tracked a market running hot and then easing back toward normal. Records broke month after month while stock hit all-time lows, and the reports circled one tension throughout: ferocious buyer demand against an unprecedented shortage of homes to buy. By the autumn the writing began watching for the cooling it kept predicting.
Themes
- Supply starvation drove everything. The July report quantified it as a "shortfall of 225,000 homes for sale," and December reported stock per branch halved to 14.
- The regions led, London lagged. May framed 2021 as "the year of the northern mover," with Wales up 13% while London stood still at +0.2%.
- Records stacked up: new price highs for four straight months, then a "full house" in October with every region and sector at record highs for the first time since March 2007.
- The market kept slowing and re-accelerating. June flagged "early signs of slowing," August logged the first price drop, then October surged 1.8% again.
- The "power buyer" became the year's recurring character: those already sold subject to contract or with cash, out-muscling chained buyers.
Sentiment & tone
The mood was upbeat but the most guarded of any year, and the +0.74 net sentiment per 1k words shows it. Confidence runs through the superlatives, with "record," "all-time high," and "hottest ever" landing constantly. The hedging sits right alongside, because the writing kept bracing for a turn it could not quite call. June admitted "this super-charged activity cannot go on forever." August warned that price drops "can ring economy alarm bells." By December the tone settled into relief, forecasting a "closer to normal" 2022. Excitement and wariness held in the same sentences all year.
Key words & phrases
The vocabulary ran hot and physical. The "race for space" appears in May. The market is called "frenetic" and "hectic," activity is "frenzied," and homes are "like gold dust." Buyers are "out-muscled" by "power buyers," stock gets "snapped up." The South West becomes the "hottest selling region." November turns to "bargain-hunting" and "festively distracted buyers."
Worth noting
- The August report broke the streak with the first price fall of the year, then immediately reframed it: the drop was confined to the upper end while mass-market sectors hit fresh records.
- October's "full house" headline marks the year's peak, the first time since March 2007 that every region and every sector set a record together.
- Becky Munday of Munday's Estate Agents in London: "I have never seen a sellers' market quite like it," echoed almost word for word by Countrywide's Toby Philips in August.
- December closed with a hard number that captured the squeeze: seven in ten advertised properties marked sold subject to contract, against two in ten back in 2012.
What this year was about
Words this year used far more than the rest of the corpus — its preoccupations, not generic property language.
| word | uses | vs rest of corpus |
|---|---|---|
| incentive | 4 | 23.5× |
| powerful | 8 | 23.5× |
| shortfall | 6 | 17.6× |
| abating | 3 | 17.6× |
| race | 3 | 17.6× |
| slackening | 3 | 17.6× |
| hectic | 3 | 17.6× |
| highs | 6 | 17.6× |
| hottest | 3 | 17.6× |
| browsing | 3 | 17.6× |
| gearing | 3 | 17.6× |
| main | 5 | 14.7× |
Tone profile
Hits in this year, raw and per 1,000 words.
| category | hits | per 1k words |
|---|---|---|
| superlatives | 100 | 9.19 |
| hedges | 67 | 6.16 |
| reassurance | 13 | 1.2 |
| caution to sellers | 5 | 0.46 |
| softening pivots | 102 | 9.38 |
Headlines
- MayNew price record as Wales and the north lead the way and London stands still
- JuneMarket still frenetic but early signs of slowing due to record prices and lack of choice
- July2021 buyer frenzy reveals 225,000 shortfall in number of homes for sale
- AugustMass-market prices hit new record as upper end cools
- SeptemberHottest ever competition to buy a home and highest ever prices
- OctoberPrice records in all regions & sectors mark ‘full house’ for first time since 2007
- NovemberBiggest price drop since January as sellers tempt bargain-hunting pre-Xmas buyers
- DecemberNew Year resolution sellers gearing up for 2022 as closer to normal market beckons
Voices this year
Agents (13), Tim Bannister (7), Agent (2), Glynis Frew (2), Nick Menzies (2), Bannister (1), Simon Bradbury (1), Richard Palfreeman (1)
Sample report — December 2021
New Year resolution sellers gearing up for 2022 as closer to normal market beckons
- The price of property coming to market sees its usual December dip, down by 0.7% (-£2,234) this month
- Following a hectic last eighteen months, Rightmove predicts a closer to normal market during 2022:
- While fully available stock for sale has hit a new record low this month, valuation requests from home-owners are 19% up on this time a year ago, suggesting more people will be making a New Year resolution to move
- Strong buyer demand is carrying forward into 2022, with November showing buyer numbers 41% up on election-subdued 2019, and still 3% up on booming 2020
- With two months of data yet to be reported, 2021 has already seen the highest level of completed home sales since 2007, and Rightmove expects 1.5 million for the full year:
As an exceptionally busy 2021 draws to a close, Rightmove expects a closer to normal though still busy market in 2022. One sign of a return to traditional norms is the continuation of the seasonal fall in the price of property coming to market, down by 0.7% (-£2,234) on the month, compared to a 0.6% fall this time a year ago. While we forecast prices to rise by another 5% in 2022, some of the edge will be taken off sellers’ pricing power by increasingly stretched buyer affordability, and more buyer choice boosted by previously hesitant sellers now gearing up for a New Year move. This would be particularly timely, as fully available stock for sale has hit a new record low again this month. Promisingly, requests from home-owners to estate agents to have their home valued are 19% up on this time a year ago, indicating that much-needed buyer choice will be coming to market in the new year.
Tim Bannister, Rightmove’s Director of Property Data, comments: “The kind of frenzied market we’ve seen in the last 18 months happens only a few times in most home-owners’ buying and selling lifetimes, exacerbated by the even rarer event of a global pandemic pushing homes higher up most people’s priorities. While the pandemic is still having an ever-changing impact on society as we head into the new year, we expect a housing market moving closer to normal during the course of 2022. A return to a less frenetic market due to more choice, and forecast slightly higher interest rates, will suit many movers who have held back during the last 18 hectic months. With a jump in the number of owners requesting valuations from agents with a view to marketing their homes, it looks like many of this group are now gearing up to make it a new year resolution to move, so more buyer choice could now be on the cards. A rise in interest rates is likely next year, and whilst a rise is often regarded as unhelpful to the market, a slowing of the fast pace of sales, and associated pace of price rises, will help the return to more normality that will suit many movers. Buyer demand and market momentum remain strong going into 2022, with November showing buyer numbers 41% up on the election-subdued 2019, and still 3% up on booming 2020.”