House builder Berkeley Group Holdings (LON:BKG) has raised concerns that the chancellor's attempts to address the housing shortage may not work as well as hoped.
The London-focused outfit said in a trading statement covering the period from November 2015 to February 2016 that the London housing market had remained stable over the period, and that it was seeing good underlying demand for its properties.
Cash due on forward sales remains in excess of £3bn, the company revealed.
Berkeley used the trading statement to get on its soapbox and moan about a number of factors that, while they do not appear to be preventing the company from making a handsome profit from the housing market, do seem to be impeding the government's attempts to address the persistent and acute imbalance between housing supply and demand.
These factors include: complex and sometimes conflicting policies around planning and affordable housing; competing demands on limited and reducing public sector resources; and one of the world's highest property taxation regimes.
Berkeley's shares fell 3.7% to 3,138p as it said reservations were some 4% lower than in the year-earlier period, due to a change in mix of product and the strength of the forward sales secured in recent years.
Transaction levels at the upper end of the housing market have been affected by the significant increase in transaction taxes over the last 18 months, which will have consequential effects on both social mobility and the supply of new homes, Berkeley said.
All that being said, the company is still on course to deliver £2bn in pre-tax profit in aggregated over the three years culminating in fiscal 2017/18.
For the current year, the board anticipates results will be at the top end of expectations and is on target to pay a further £1 per share in September 2016, having paid a quid a share in January of this year.