Market Drayton boasts fast rise in home sales
A town in Shropshire enjoyed one of the fastest increases in house sales in England and Wales this year, new figures revealed today.
Market Drayton has seen a 45 per cent increase in sales according to the study, which compares the first half of last year with the first six months of this year.
In total the figures reveal almost two-thirds of towns in England and Wales have seen year-on-year increases in house sales.
The rises have been helped by improvements in affordability, with house prices in the 10 biggest property sales hotspots falling by 7 per cent over the past four years, Lloyds TSB said.
Some 324, or 65 per cent, of the 500 towns tracked saw an increase in home sales in the first half of this year compared with the first six months of 2011.
This is more than double the 151 towns with an rise in sales in the first half of 2011, researchers said.
The seaside town of Felixstowe in Suffolk saw the biggest increase in home sales with a 60 per cent rise, followed by Brighouse in West Yorkshire with a 53 percent increase.
Market Drayton is the fourth town on the list.
The two towns with the biggest declines in home sales are in the north west, with Salford experiencing a 28 per cent fall and Leigh in Wigan seeing a 27 per cent decline.
Overall, there were 282,086 home sales in England and Wales in the first half of 2012, 2.2 per cent higher than in the same period in 2011.
Suren Thiru, Lloyds TSB housing economist, said: "It is encouraging that the number of towns across England and Wales seeing a rise in home sales has increased significantly over the past year.
"This highlights the very mixed state of the housing market at a local level compared with the rather subdued picture nationally."
Lloyds TSB used Land Registry sales figures for the study.
