New homes buck the trend in Dundee

Award winning house-builder, Miller Homes is enjoying a fruitful summer at its Bramble Meadows development in Dundee – ‘City of Discovery’. In recent months, the company has experienced a healthy upturn in sales, bucking the trend currently faced by many in the housing sector.

With 14 sales secured over the past four months, the development is experiencing high footfall and more importantly, a healthy conversion rate.

Anne Marie Britton, sales director for Miller Homes in Scotland, says: “When we launched Bramble Meadows just over two years ago, the development initially enjoyed a very positive level of interest. However, with the downturn in the market, as you would expect, footfall eased significantly.

“The upsurge in sales recently underlines a renewed confidence our buyers have and this is down to the fact that we created an incentive last summer with exactly that purpose in mind. MiWay was specifically designed to assist and support our buyers at a time when the credit crunch was taking effect. We are now reaping the positive impact this scheme is having on our customers.

“Demand for quality, family homes has and continues to remain consistently high in Dundee. Therefore, by giving our clients the added security that they can buy a new home without having to worry about a substantial deposit, we are seeing several clients who initially showed an interest in our homes pre-Christmas now coming back to sign on the dotted line.”

MiWay is the perfect deal for buyers who don’t have a sizeable deposit or for those struggling to find a mortgage. Buyers are given the opportunity to pay ‘75% now, 25% later’. Miller Homes essentially provides its purchasers with an interest free loan to make up the remaining 25% of the home price, allowing buyers to shop around for a smaller mortgage.

Unlike a shared equity deal, buyers with MiWay own 100% of their property from the outset, and the loan from Miller Homes is only payable after ten years or when the property is sold, whichever comes first, and the owner simply pays back 25% of their home’s market value at that time. So for buyers at Bramble Meadows, this means that they can secure a four-bedroom detached Severn, currently priced at £249,995, for only £187,946.

As one of the UK’s most respected builders, which is just short of celebrating its 75th anniversary, Miller Homes has the depth of experience of being through downturns in the market before. This gives the company the advantage of knowing the fundamental steps that quickly need to be taken in order to maintain consumer confidence, and it is clearly working in Dundee.

Could the encouragement Miller Homes' customers have received be having wider implications in Dundee overall – as the city’s property market seems to be experiencing the first positive steps on the path towards recovery.

According to Helen Wylie, manager at Tayside Solicitors Property Centre TSPC, while no one is denying that prices in Dundee are down by about 10% on average in comparison to this time last year, there is room for increasing optimism.

Helen says, “Since the start of the year, we have had more registrations coming on. In February we had 160 properties registered with the TSPC and in April, 299. Part of the reason for this is that those selling an existing property are now being much more realistic about the price they can achieve, and the valuations provided through Home Reports is helping with this.

“So while many buyers remain cautious, we are experiencing a rise in enquiry levels and also a willingness by sellers to be more flexible about the value of their property. This is turn is helping to create movement within the market in Dundee.”

Situated on the fringes of Dundee, in the picturesque town of Broughty Ferry, Bramble Meadows offers a substantial collection of three, four and five-bedroom detached homes, with selected plots not only benefitting from MiWay, but several of the properties also offer Miller Homes’ MoveMaker+ incentive.

As an alternative to MiWay, MoveMaker+ covers the cost of a buyer's estate agent, survey and essential Home Report fees. Miller Homes will also contribute towards their removal costs and legal fees. And when purchasers arrive in their new home, it will also be fully carpeted throughout, a welcome benefit for any buyer.

Prices at Bramble Meadows currently start from £249,995. For further information on MiWay or MoveMaker+, or to arrange a visit, go to millerhomes.co.uk. The sales and marketing suite is open daily from 11am until 6pm.

* Miller Homes usual terms and conditions apply.