23rd September marks the official start of Autumn in the UK and 2019 marks the 200th anniversary of when John Keats spent a short while in Winchester and was inspired to write one of his most famous and best loved poems To Autumn.
Just as the seasons change with alarming speed and regularity so too have there been constant changes in the economics of property.
In 1818 while Keats was wandering around the water meadows of Winchester, 50,000 protesters were gathering at St Peter’s Field in Manchester, protesting the right to vote. At the time the government believed that unless you owned a significant amount of property and had a stake in the country, you could not be trusted to vote. Most of the land was owned by a tiny number of landlords and the majority of the population rented.
100 years later the 1919 Housing and Town Planning Act came into force and the 1920s saw massive growth in privately built housing. Between 1919 and 1929 just under half a million houses were built.
By 2019, whilst the whole world seems to have changed, there are some comforting constants and ‘An Englishman’s home will always be his castle’. The next 100 years may see a return to the majority renting, but this time with legislation on the side of the tenant and their rights and interests protected. There will always be a demand for property. Prices will continue to fluctuate and during the first half of Autumn we may all hold our breath and wait to see what happens on 31st October. Yet in this glorious county of Hampshire whilst, in the famous words of Keats, “The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft; And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.”, so the team here will be as busy as ever.