Will Brexit Increase Home Improvement Costs |
Posted: January 26, 2019 |
Like everyone else, we understand that you are sick and tired of reading about Brexit all of the time, but if you are thinking about making improvements to your house at some point in the near future, then most likely it is worth giving a little thought to the timing of your upcoming project. Whatever your viewpoint happens to be, it is unlikely that the world as we all know it is going to end on 29 March 2019 or be any different on the 30th as it was on the 28th. Brexit has had a more gradual impact on the construction industry that it has started to have an impact already on home improvement costs. Will Brexit be causing home improvement costs to go up?'Yes' and 'no' is the answer (which is definitely a true politician's response). Brexit's impact, or the referendum vote more accurately, has definitely put a squeeze on the UK's labour market. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) reports that the difference between how many EU citizens are coming into the UK and how many are leaving decrease to 87,000 to March this year, which is the lowest it has been since December 2012. According to the ONS, the shift was driven both by an increase in the number of EU citizens emigrating and a decline in those arriving to the EU. What is even more significant perhaps is net migration into the UK from A8 countries - which include Lithuania, Hungary, the Czech Republic, and Poland - that in 2004 - went negative for the very first time. There were 47,000 departures and 45,000 arrivals. What is that significant? Because many of the migrant workers were propping up the building products and construction industries. However, as a whole, door and window manufacturers have recruited from A8 counties, and with fewer of these recruits coming from those countries into the UK. It has been difficult to recruit and employment costs have increased. At the very same time, more people are employed. In October the Office of National Statistics reported that wages were up 3.1% in the three months that ended in August, at the same time last year - which represented the biggest average increase in wages since the economic collapse of 2008. Is it Brexit causing it to be down? It is hard to say one way or the other. Labour costs are definitely increasing for several different reasons and these historically have tended to ultimately lead to price increases for the consumer. The falling £ has been another factor. On the contrary, home improvement businesses like the KJM Group reports that the business carries on despite the volatility in the market. The country hasn't come to a standstill and that, given the political circumstance of the nation, is a good sign. For home improvement costs, what are the long-term forecasts due to Brexit?It is obviously very hard to predict anything very accurately in today's climate. A Green Paper was published this summer by the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB) that suggested that Brexit was starting to have a creeping influence over the construction sector. It showed that one-third of builders had concerns about being able to recruit skilled workers, while 37% of those working in the sector currently were born outside of the UK. Builders have also seen building material costs increase 3-4% over the past years, and that those expenses were being passed to homeowners. Reasons why Brexit makes it such a good time for investing in energy efficient doors and windowsIf you look at the current situation, on balance, if you are able to afford and are considering new energy efficient doors and window, it might be beneficial to purchase them early. The reason isn't because we are making a doomsday scenario case. It is just that, like everyone else, we don't really know what is going to occur, whereas as right now, we do know what the current costs are for new energy efficient doors and windows and they are affordable. Aside from that, it is worth looking into that is occurring within the energy markets. Home heating costs continue to increase. An announcement was made by British Gas in August that energy costs were increasing by 4$, with the average bill increasing by £44 to £1,205 per year. If you are able to afford it, it makes a lot of sense to try keeping those rising costs down by making energy efficient improvements to your house - and new energy efficient doors and windows are an excellent way to do this.
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