National recognition, local expertise

Happy Summer!

Wherever the season takes you this year we hope you manage to relax, take five and enjoy some well deserved summer sunshine, fresh air and a chance to recharge your batteries.

Inside our Newsletter this month you can read about the happiest place to live in Britain; how the Summer Budget can affect home owners and landlords; Hunters continued growth and our new status as a plc and find out how to create your own herb garden. We hope you enjoy the read.

If you have stories or news to share, please get in touch. Email marketing@hunters.com or follow us on Twitter - @YO1_Marketing.

Summer Greetings from
Hunters Marketing Team

The Summer Budget delivered by George Osborne last month contained two substantive policies relating to the UK housing market. Firstly, the raising of the inheritance tax threshold for property by &175,000 per person, means that a couple can bequeath their family home to their children or grandchildren without any tax due up to &1,000,000 (after the mortgage). Secondly, there is to be a phased approach to reducing tax relief for Buy to Let landlords. Landlords who claim relief on their mortgage interest payments will only be able to do so at the basic rate of tax from 2017 (phased in over four years).

Hunters Managing Director Glynis Frew was quick to offer her comments and said, “We welcome the Chancellor’s new inheritance tax thresholds, the last election taught us that home ownership is very important to the nation and when people have worked hard to own a residence and have already paid taxes they should be able to pass this onto their children tax-free."

“Despite a phased approach, we were disappointed to hear of the reduction in tax breaks for Buy to Let investors as this will discourage new landlords from entering the sector and will result in a lack of stock. This will inevitably lead to higher rents as at the end of the day landlords are business people and will need to compensate for this.”

At the end of July, property portal Rightmove released its year to date record breaking results.

They reported that they had 50% more listings than Zoopla, resulting in record traffic numbers with visits to the site up 17% bringing them to 110m per month, and page views up 13% to a record 1.5bn per month.

Agents and developers received a record 25m enquires "with data showing that Rightmove is by far the largest source of buyer, seller, tenant and landlord opportunities for them".

Zoopla have also reported they received 16.4m visits in June leaving OnTheMarket with only 1.07m visits for that month. Not forgetting the other property portals such as Prime Location and property pages on websites such as The Independent and Mail Online are powered by Zoopla reaching 1000s of buyers and tenants every month.

Hunters Property Auction - York Racecourse - 9th September 2015 - Starts at 6pm

 28 Trafalgar Square, Scarborough, YO12 7PY

* Guide Price &90,000 - &100,000 *

A substantial nine bedroomed terraced property, formerly utilised as a guest house (still registered). Situated close to the North Bay, Cricket Ground and the town centre. Possible development into flats.

 12 Station Avenue, Bridlington, YO16 4LZ

* Guide Price &200,000 - &210,000 *

A substantial 7 bedroomed property, previously utilised as a retirement home. Ripe for development with potential to be converted into flats.

 Boatsmans Lodge, 12b St Sepulchre Street, Scarborough, YO11 1QF

* Guide Price &60,000 - &65,000 *

A fantastic opportunity to renovate a deceptively spacious two storey property, just a short walk away from the Scarborough sea front.

 Hall View Cottage, Main Street, Helperby, YO61 2PW

* Guide Price &230,000 - &250,000 *

A double fronted three storey, four bedroomed period home located in the attractive and sought after village of Helperby.

 Flat 4, 36 Filey Road, Scarborough, YO11 2TU

* Guide Price &50,000 - &60,000 *

Well-presented second floor apartment with sea views in this popular area of Scarborough.

 B8 Storage and Distribution, Gowthorpe Lane, Full Sutton, YO41 5QL

* Guide Price &125,000 - &150,000 *

Distribution site with five newly refurbished storage units and a further building requiring refurbishment.

 14 New Mill, Kell Lane, Wainstalls, Halifax, HX2 7UW

* Guide Price &70,000 - &80,000 *

ATTENTION INVESTORS/ FIRST TIME BUYERS - Well-presented two bedroomed apartment situated in a peaceful and idyllic village location.

Building Plot, Sand Hole Lane, Shipton by Beningbrough, YO30 1BL

* Guide Price &65,000 - &75,000 *

This building plot in the sought after location of Shipton by Beningbrough has detailed planning consent to build a spacious, detached, three bedroomed cottage with private access and good sized garden.

 Lincswold, Hemlington Village Road, Snainton, Middlesbrough, TS8 9DR

* Guide Price &230,000 - &250,000 *

Significantly upgraded throughout, this is a stunning five bedroomed bungalow standing on a generous plot with gardens to three sides.

 18 Sunrise Drive, The Bay, Moor Road, Filey, YO14 9GF

* Guide Price &35,000 - &45,000 *

IDEAL INVESTMENT - A one bedroomed first floor holiday cottage situated in the prestigious holiday village of 'The Bay', Filey.

 12 Vicarage Lane, Sherburn, Malton, YO17 8PL

* Guide Price &50,000 - &55,000 *

IDEAL FOR INVESTMENT - This is a two bedroomed first floor flat in need of some cosmetic updating. With private garden and off street communal parking.

 Garage Premises, Grange Garth, Fulford, YO10 4BA

* Guide Price &15,000 - &20,000 *

Rarely available, this is a secure freehold garage, located in the sought after area of Fulford.

 Plot 1, Land West of the Pond, Main Street, Barmby Moor, YO42 4ER

* Guide Price &200,000 - &220,000 *

Full planning permission is in place to build a five bedroomed detached family home with triple garage and garden.

 Plot 2, Land West of the Pond, Main Street, Barmby Moor, YO42 4ER

* Guide Price &180,000 - &200,000 *

Full planning permission is in place to build a four bedroomed detached family home with double garage and garden.

 93 Skipton Road, Harrogate, HG1 4LJ

* Guide Price &230,000 - &250,000 *

A spacious and imposing five bedroomed semi-detached property which is in need of some modernisation.

If you are interested in any of the above lots, please contact the Auction Department on 01904 756116 or email auctions@hunters.com

Legal packs will be available via the legal pack section of our website www.hunters.com/auctions

If you register now and choose the lot you are interested in, you will be notified automatically as soon as the legal pack arrives. Click here to register now

Hunters reached another milestone on the 2nd of July 2015 when we became a public limited company. Our shares are now trading on the AIM market of the London Stock Exchange and rose over 20% in the first few hours.

Commenting on the listing our Chairman Kevin Hollinrake said: “This is an exciting time for us as we continue to drive forward our growth initiatives for expansion and to ultimately achieve being the UK’s favourite estate agency. With access to further capital, we see significant opportunity to increase our penetration in the UK, strengthening our position as one of the leading UK estate agency brands”.

Managing Director Glynis Frew commented: “Hunters is a highly ambitious company. Our success to date has been born out of our focus on providing our customers with an exceptional service combined with local market knowledge. The Group is excited about its next chapter as a public company. This status will help to further enhance the Hunters brand and provide access to capital to accelerate business growth.”  

If you are interested in finding out more about this please click here to visit our Investor Relations page.

Landlords who fail to tell HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) about the income they receive from letting out residential property in the UK or abroad, could face hefty penalties, or even a prosecution. HMRC suspects there are up to 1.5m landlords at risk of under or non-declaration of profits arising from rental income, with over &550m tax at risk.

HMRC have The Let Property Campaign which features tools and guidance for landlords to check their rental or letting income is calculated correctly. Landlords must make sure they follow the correct procedure when it comes to declaring rental income, to avoid any tax issues.

HMRC wants to help and support landlords get things right and an e-learning course on letting property can be found at by clicking here.

Any landlords who haven’t told HMRC about rental income, or haven’t declared the correct amount, should refer to the guidance at from the gov.uk website by clicking here or alternatively call the Let Property campaign helpline on 03000 514 479.

Rightmove have released a recent survey and have announced that for the third time in a row Harrogate has been crowned the happiest place to live in Britain.

Rightmove surveyed 24,000 people in 130 different places, and asked them a number of questions about their home, including how proud they were, how nicely decorated it was, how safe they felt, how much space they had, and how nice the neighbours were.

'This is the third year in a row that Harrogate has been voted the happiest place to live in the UK, and if you come to the town it's easy to see why. In the town itself there are beautiful areas of open parkland and we are surrounded by the Yorkshire Dales and the beautiful countryside. Harrogate also has excellent shopping facilities, a wide variety of restaurants and cafes and a choice of excellent schooling including the Grammar School. People in and around the area have a great quality of life with low unemployment, low crime and excellent local services.

The 'Tour de France 2014' helped put Harrogate on the map, and its popularity has continued to grow with a wide range of properties available from first time buyer/investment properties right up to country estates, it's a really nice and diverse market to work in and I am very lucky to be involved with one of our flagship branches here.'

Click here to read more about the results of the Rightmove survey.

Read more to find out how you can have your own summer herb garden
Click here to read How to create a summer herb garden.