Scottish property market worth £18.2 billion

The residential sales market has increased by 67 per cent since 2009-10 and reached an 11-year-high in 2018-19, but remains 21 per cent below the pre-financial crisis level in 2007-08 (£23.1 billion).

The Property Market Report is the main statistical compendium publication from Registers of Scotland. It details the major trends in the Scottish land and property market since 2003-04, includes residential and non-residential markets as well as key statistics on house prices and sale transactions.

The average price of a residential property in Scotland in 2018-19 was £178,991, up 2.2 per cent on 2017-18 and 16 per cent when compared with the pre-financial crash average price of £154,817 in 2007-08. Since 2003-04, the start of RoS house price data, the average residential property price in Scotland has increased by 77 per cent.

The volume of residential property sales in Scotland has risen by 44 per cent since the recent low in 2011-12 to 101,628 sales in 2018-19. The sales volume remain 32 per cent below the pre-financial crisis level peak of 150,455 sales in 2006-07. In the past year, sales have fallen slightly by 0.5 per cent.

The report also looks at the non-residential market. The total market value of all types of non-residential sales in 2018-19 was £4.0 billion. Commercial sales accounted for 81 per cent with the remainder from sales of forestry, agriculture and land.

Accountable officer Janet Egdell said: “The Scottish property market is a significant component of the Scottish economy. In 2018-19, the total value of residential sales continued to rise, largely due to average prices continuing to increase while the volume of sales has levelled off in recent years.”

The report also found that 12 per cent of residential property sales in Scotland in 2018-19 were new-builds, the highest proportion since 2008-09.

Twenty-eight per cent of all residential properties sold in Scotland in 2018-19 were located within one of Scotland’s seven cities with most sales in Glasgow.

Sixty-nine per cent of residential sales transactions in 2018-19 were with a mortgage, with cash sales accounting for the balance.

There were 181 residential property sales for more than £1 million in 2018-19, two-thirds of which were in the City of Edinburgh (119 sales).

Further information on trends in cash and mortgage-financed sales volumes, the market within Scotland’s seven cities and local authorities, sales of properties within new-build developments and trends by house type can be found in the report and accompanying data tables.