One fifth of people who did not move house over the previous year are planning to in the next 12 months, says John Charcol.

The figures come from a survey the broker carried out through YouGov in July, which also found that two thirds of people who did buy a home in the previous 12 months reported the stamp duty holiday as not being a “major factor” in their decision.

And one third of people who took part in the survey who did buy a new home moved more than 10 miles from where they previously lived.

John Charcol points out that the recently released HMRC transaction figures for June show a “huge increase” to 213,120, an all-time monthly record.

Being higher than the 174,060 transactions recorded in March, “these two monthly peaks clearly demonstrate the effect of the stamp duty land tax deadline, with the April and May numbers being 113,310 and 102,190 respectively,” the broker adds.

Government figures also show that after five years of “very little change” in annual figures, there was a 11.2% drop in transactions to 1.05m – but with such a strong first half of 2021, “the provisional figure of 821,720 is 79% of the total for the whole of 2020 and 114% higher than the depressed figures for the first half of 2020.”

The broker believes that transaction for 2021 in total are on track for 1.4m, which would be the highest seen since 2007, where there were 1.6m transactions.

John Charcol product technical manager Nick Morrey comments: “The results of this survey are extremely interesting as the figures suggest that the stamp duty holiday was not necessarily the main driving factor for most purchasers as suggested by many market commentators – although it is very likely it was driving factor in making sure completion was on or before 30 June.

What it means is that people would have bought a new home regardless of the chancellor’s incentive. In addition to this, the desire for people to buy remains strong, which bodes well for the property market both later this year and into 2022.

“With some of the lowest rates ever seen being offered by lenders it is also one of the cheapest times to obtain a mortgage – even at 95% LTV

“A key driver in the property market is always monthly mortgage cost and the current record low mortgage rates offset much of the impact of higher house prices.”