What could a Budget actually do to get more people moving home? Ask estate agents, and most appear to think the answer this year will be: not much.
A survey by the agent comparison site GetAgent, reported by PropertyWire on 20 October, found that 84% of the estate agents who responded were sceptical that the Budget on 28 October would include measures to stimulate property sales. More than half, 56%, said the market had performed more weakly than they expected this year; 37% said it was in line with expectations, and 7% said it had been stronger.
The published reporting does not disclose the survey’s sample size, fieldwork dates or methodology, so the figures cannot be treated as representative of every estate agent in the country. The research was also carried out before the government announced its new Your First Home scheme. But GetAgent’s co-founder Colby Short raised a question that remains relevant despite that announcement: whether supporting first-time buyers alone will be enough to stimulate the wider housing market.
The scepticism is understandable. Yet the more important question is whether the measures agents might welcome would genuinely help the people trying to move home, or simply produce a temporary increase in transactions.
Where the market is actually weak
The housing market is not one number. Agents’ sense of a disappointing year is consistent with Rightmove’s October figures, which show sales being agreed at a rate 8% below a year earlier. Enquiries from potential buyers are down 9%, while new listings are up 3%, leaving the number of homes for sale at its highest for this time of year since 2014. Buyers have more choice, but sellers face greater competition and agents must work harder to turn instructions into completed sales.
There is an important qualification. Rightmove describes sales activity as surprisingly resilient given the rise in borrowing costs, with the 8% annual decline broadly matching the pattern seen throughout 2026. The market is weaker, but it has not suddenly stopped functioning. Buyers are still making offers where the price and property are right, suggesting that part of the difficulty lies in the gap between what sellers hope to achieve and what purchasers can now afford.
Mortgage figures reinforce the pressure on demand. The Bank of England recorded 54,900 approvals for house purchases in August, down from 55,900 in July and below the preceding six-month average of around 60,100. Approvals are an indicator of future mortgage-financed transactions rather than completed sales, but the direction is consistent with buyers becoming more cautious.
The most obvious constraint is borrowing cost. Rightmove reports that the average advertised two-year fixed mortgage rate reached 5.55% in October, compared with 4.25% in February. On its calculation, that rise has added around £250 a month to a typical new mortgage. For a family hoping to move to a larger home, that can absorb much of the money previously available for additional borrowing. For first-time buyers, it can make the difference between a mortgage payment that fits comfortably within their income and one that leaves little room for other costs.
That affordability problem is also reflected in recent research on first-time buyers taking on higher mortgage payments than their previous rent. A buyer may still be able to obtain a mortgage, but whether they feel confident committing to the repayments is another matter.
A Chancellor cannot directly set mortgage rates. Those are determined by lenders, with fixed-rate pricing heavily influenced by financial markets and expectations for interest rates. But the Budget can affect those expectations through decisions on taxation, borrowing and spending. Fiscal measures that unsettle markets could increase financing costs rather than relieve them, while a credible economic outlook may improve confidence without guaranteeing cheaper mortgages.
There is also a more immediate source of hesitation: the Budget itself. Rightmove has suggested that some prospective buyers may be waiting for the details of Your First Home, while other households are assessing what tax and financial changes could mean for them. A government announcement intended to support future purchases can therefore temporarily delay decisions before its details are settled.
The levers a Chancellor does have
The first option is transaction tax. Stamp Duty Land Tax applies in England and Northern Ireland, while Wales and Scotland operate their own devolved property transaction taxes. A UK Budget can change SDLT, potentially reducing the upfront cost of moving for buyers within those two jurisdictions.
A cut could help people beyond the first-time buyer market. Owners wishing to downsize, families needing more space and people relocating for work can all face substantial tax costs simply for moving from one property to another. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has argued that stamp duty discourages housing mobility, leaving some people in homes that no longer suit their circumstances and preventing others from moving into them. In that sense, lower transaction taxes could release existing homes into the market without requiring new construction.
But not every buyer would benefit equally. Qualifying first-time buyers already pay no SDLT on purchases within the applicable relief thresholds, while those buying more expensive properties can face considerably larger bills. A broad reduction could therefore deliver substantial savings to purchasers who were already willing and able to move. Previous temporary stamp duty holidays have encouraged transactions to be brought forward ahead of deadlines, and some of the benefit can be absorbed into higher prices when competition increases. A permanent reform designed to reduce the cost of moving might have more lasting effects, but it would also reduce Treasury revenue unless the lost receipts were replaced elsewhere.
The second option is direct help with purchasing. The government has already announced plans for Your First Home, an equity loan scheme intended to assist first-time buyers in England purchasing newly built homes from participating developers. Under the proposals announced in September, buyers could purchase with a deposit of 2.5% and a government-backed equity loan of 20%, subject to income limits, local property price caps and other conditions still to be confirmed.
On a £300,000 property, the proposed structure would mean a £7,500 deposit, a £60,000 equity loan and a conventional mortgage covering the remaining £232,500, assuming the buyer and property qualified and the balance could be mortgage-funded. That could make an important difference to someone struggling to assemble a deposit. It would not, however, remove the requirement to demonstrate that the mortgage repayments are affordable, and buyers will need to understand how the equity loan is eventually repaid and what happens when its initial interest-free period ends.
The wider consequences are more complicated. Supporting purchases of new-build homes directs demand towards developers, potentially helping them sustain sales and continue building during a difficult period. That could benefit construction firms, their suppliers and buyers who might otherwise remain unable to purchase. Yet the assistance is not available to someone buying an existing home, and a first-time buyer purchasing directly from a developer does not automatically start the chain of onward moves that can follow the purchase of an existing property.
There is evidence that the distinction matters. An independent evaluation of the previous Help to Buy equity loan scheme, published in September 2026, found that it supported both homeownership and additional housing supply. It also identified an additional price premium of around 1% for Help to Buy properties compared with similar new-build homes purchased without the scheme. The finding suggests that buyer assistance can deliver genuine benefits while allowing some of the subsidy to be reflected in prices.
The design of Your First Home will therefore be crucial. The income limits, property caps, developer contributions and eventual loan repayment terms could determine whether support primarily improves access for households otherwise excluded from ownership or whether a greater share of the advantage is captured elsewhere. For housebuilders, the scheme could support sales and development confidence; for estate agents handling existing homes, its effect on transaction volumes may be less immediate.
A third area of potential improvement is the transaction process itself, although much of that work falls outside the Budget. In England, delays between agreeing a sale and completing it, together with the risk of transactions collapsing, remain significant obstacles to moving. The government estimates that around one in three transactions falls through, often after buyers and sellers have already committed considerable time and money.
Its home buying and selling reform roadmap, published in June, proposes earlier provision of property information, standardised sales packs, digital improvements and measures intended to create greater certainty between buyers and sellers. Making legal and property information available sooner could help reveal problems before they derail a transaction, reducing wasted expenditure and allowing agents and conveyancers to concentrate on progressing viable sales.
There would be difficulties to resolve. Gathering comprehensive information before marketing could increase upfront costs for sellers, including those whose homes never attract a buyer. It would also require sufficient professional capacity and reliable information systems. The more substantial compulsory measures remain future reforms requiring further implementation and, where appropriate, legislation; they are not already in force.
Nevertheless, reducing avoidable delays could improve the market without increasing how much buyers borrow or offering a subsidy on every purchase. It would not create a sudden surge in sales, but a transaction process that wastes less time and money could gradually make more households willing to move.
What agents want, and what home movers need
There is a difference between what would help estate agents and what would help home movers, although their interests frequently overlap. Agents depend on completed transactions and the fees they generate. Home movers need suitable properties they can afford and a process that allows them to complete without excessive cost, uncertainty or delay. A temporary stamp duty cut might bring additional business into agencies while offering limited lasting relief to buyers if prices subsequently rise. A more reliable conveyancing process could deliver quieter but more durable improvements for everyone involved.
The distinction also helps explain why the GetAgent findings should not be interpreted as evidence that the Budget cannot support housing. Agents are understandably interested in measures that generate activity across the existing market, whereas a new-build equity loan scheme is designed partly to support a particular group of buyers and the development industry. Those objectives may both be worthwhile, but success in one does not guarantee success in the other.
Nor is government policy the only influence on how many homes change hands. Sellers who continue to price their properties according to what comparable homes achieved when mortgage rates were lower may struggle to attract buyers operating under tighter budgets. Agents have a responsibility to give realistic valuations, while sellers must weigh their desired price against the cost and uncertainty of waiting. In a price-sensitive market, an achievable sale can matter more than an ambitious asking price.
Once an offer is accepted, the practical problems of completing it also remain. Mortgage difficulties, unresolved legal enquiries, surveys and broken chains can all prevent an agreed transaction from becoming a completed move. Our examination of why conveyancing takes so long explains how these delays arise and why better information earlier in the process could make a difference.
For agents, that means the health of the market cannot be judged solely by the number of instructions won or offers received. For buyers and sellers, it means a functioning housing market requires more than access to a mortgage or a temporary reduction in tax. The price must be realistic, the borrowing sustainable and the transaction capable of reaching completion.
The limits of a Budget
The scepticism expressed in the GetAgent survey may prove justified if the Chancellor’s announcements on 28 October offer little beyond the first-time buyer scheme already outlined. But it would be premature to judge the Budget before its measures are published, and the absence of a dramatic housing stimulus would not necessarily mean that nothing useful had been done.
The largest immediate pressure on transactions remains mortgage affordability, while longer-standing problems include transaction costs, housing availability, pricing expectations and the uncertainty of the buying process. Some can be influenced by tax and spending decisions; others require regulatory reform, industry changes or a sustained improvement in household finances.
What matters is not simply whether a policy increases the number of sales agreed in the weeks after an announcement. A stamp duty change should be judged by whether it allows more people to move when they need to, rather than merely shifting purchases between months. Your First Home should be assessed against the homes it helps deliver and the households it enables to buy, without concealing the eventual cost of their borrowing. Transaction reforms should be judged by whether they reduce delays, failed sales and wasted expenditure.
Estate agents have good reasons to want a busier market. But the stronger test for the Budget is whether it leaves home movers better able to afford a suitable property and more confident that, once they agree a purchase or sale, they can actually complete it.
This article reflects information available on 20 October 2026, ahead of the UK Budget scheduled for 28 October. Government proposals, eligibility criteria and implementation arrangements may change. Property taxation and mortgage suitability depend on individual circumstances.
