Buyers of new homes in Oxfordshire tend to be aged between 30 and 50, looking to owner occupy and drawn from the local area, according to Savills dealbook data. Demand is strongly linked to employment centres; locations with major employers or with links into Oxford and London are therefore most popular.

Investors made up a small proportion of new home buyers in 2014. In Oxford, where 28% of households rent privately and demand from tenants is very strong, this is simply due to a lack of suitable stock. The rest of the county is more of an owner occupier market, which has been boosted by widespread use of Help to Buy.

Help to Buy

Help to Buy (HTB) would appear tailor-made for a location like Oxford, with potential first-time buyers in good jobs but struggling to get on the property ladder due to high prices and deposit requirements. However, in almost two years of the equity loan scheme no sales have taken place in the city.

This has two main causes: prices are still unaffordable, even when using the scheme; and very few houses have been built in the city. Would-be buyers have instead looked to the county towns, particularly Bicester and Didcot where large development schemes are underway. Kingsmere in Bicester has seen over one sale per week via the equity loan scheme since it started in April 2013. At Great Western Park in Didcot there have been almost two per week over the same period.

Other HTB-assisted sales have taken place in smaller numbers at Cholsey (nr. Wallingford) and Chilton. Developers have been reported to have adjusted their product mix to feed demand through Help to Buy for smaller two and three bedroom units.

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^{Source: DCLG, HM Treasury                                                                           *April 2013 to Feb 2015 ** October 2013 to June 2014}

Employment hotspots

Education and health are the two largest employment sectors in Oxford, with the former almost doubling in size over the past decade. But housebuilding in the city to support this expansion has not occurred. The situation means that some of the main road approaches to Oxford are at full capacity. Around half of Oxford’s 100,000 employees commute in from elsewhere in the county. Traffic in and around the city often reaches standstill at rush hour.

A lack of availability of land has meant that housing delivery hasn’t kept pace with the economic expansion of Oxford. It is therefore important to optimise the use of space and ensure a balance between housing and employment land.

Outside the city, this has been put into practice at Science Vale, an area stretching from Wantage to Didcot. Many of the county’s major science and technology employers and facilities are based in the area, and it has seen a high volume of residential development to match.

Harwell Science Campus is home to 5,000 people working in over 200 organisations. These include the European Space Agency’s UK base, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory and Diamond Light Source. Further investment in the space industry will create 700 new jobs at the £40m International Space Innovation Centre. Across the A34 is Milton Park in Didcot, home to 6,500 employees in more than 160 companies and particularly strong in biotech and ICT.

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^{Source: Oxford Economics}