Housebuilder says customer enquiries increased by “Help to Buy” announcement

Housebuilder Persimmon has seen customer enquiries boosted sharply following the government’s announcement of further help for the housing market in the budget.

In an interim management statement published today, Persimmon said that the announcement of the government’s Help to Buy package saw enquiries at Persimmon Homes and Charles Church sites, already running 24% ahead of the same point last year, increase further to 30% ahead of the same point last year.

It added that it had also seen “encouraging improvements in both visitor numbers and reservations at our developments over the last two weeks,” but that it was nevertheless too early to measure an increase in legal completions stemming directly from the government measures.

The announcement by George Osborne included the creation of a revamped £3bn equity loan scheme, called First Buy, and a mortgage guarantee scheme, due to launch in 2014, to support £130bn of house purchases.

Persimmon said it had experienced a “good start” to 2013, with trading allowing it to bring forward part of its long term capital plan to return £1.9bn of cash to shareholders. In addition to the planned 75p per share payment on June 28 this year, it said it will also declare a further 10p dividend next year, a year earlier than planned.

The firm’s weekly private sales rate per site is 4% ahead of the same period last year, with total sales 11% ahead of 2012, at £1.38bn.

The group also confirmed that Mike Farley, group chief executive (pictured), will retire from Persimmon at today’s Annual General Meeting, to be succeeded by Jeff Fairburn, currently group managing director.

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