Berkeley Group share price falls as it reports prime slowdown and questions government response to housing crisis
Berkeley Group has questioned the government's response to the housing crisis, saying that it will struggle to ease the growing gap between supply and demand.
"We welcome government's intentions to address the persistent and acute imbalance between housing supply and demand but are concerned that supply may not respond positively due a number of inter-related factors," it said in a statement today.
This included what Berkeley described as complex and sometimes conflicting policies around planning and affordable housing, competing demands on limited and reducing public sector resources and high property taxes.
It comes as Berkeley said it expected financial results to be at the top end of expectations this year.
However, it warned that transactions in the upper end of the market had slowed slightly, due to a significant increase in transaction taxes over the last 18 months.
It sold 62 properties over £2m since the half year, a similar number to the same period a year earlier, when the market slowed in the run-up to the General Election.
Berkeley also acquired four sites in the period, including two conditionally contracted long-term regeneration scheme.
Berkeley shares were down around 3.6 per cent to 3,143p in mid-morning trading.