Stoke-on-Trent Wages Outstrip House Price Growth by 14.51% since 2007

I recently read a report by the Yorkshire Building Society that 54% of the country has seen wages (salaries) rise faster than property prices in the last 10 years. The report said that in the Midlands and North, salaries had outperformed property prices since 2007, whilst in other parts of the UK, especially in the South, the opposite has happened and property prices have outperformed salaries quite noticeably.
As regular readers of my blog know, I always like to find out what has actually happened locally in Stoke-on-Trent. To talk of North and South is not specific enough for me. Therefore, to start, I looked at what has happened to salaries locally since 2007. Looking at the Office of National Statistics (ONS) data for Stoke-on-Trent City Council, some interesting figures came out...

 

	Stoke-on-Trent	West Midlands	Nationally
2007	£19,900	£22,417	£23,920
2008	£20,452	£23,390	£24,960
2009	£20,862	£23,754	£25,506
2010	£21,882	£24,398	£26,088
2011	£22,100	£24,190	£26,010
2012	£21,876	£24,404	£26,432
2013	£22,615	£25,116	£26,931
2014	£21,939	£25,022	£27,097
2015	£22,594	£25,589	£27,508
2016	£23,171	£26,406	£28,132

 Salaries in Stoke-on-Trent have risen by 16.44% since 2007 (although it’s been a bit of a rollercoaster ride to get there!) - interesting when you compare that with what has happened to salaries regionally (an increase of 17.79%) and nationally, an increase of 17.61%.

Next, I needed to find what had happened to property prices locally over the same time frame of 2007 and today. Net property values in Stoke-on-Trent are 1.93% higher than they were in late 2007 (not forgetting they did dip in 2008 and 2009). Therefore...

Wages in the Stoke-on-Trent area have increased at a higher rate than property values to the tune of 14.51% ... meaning, Stoke-on-Trent is in line with the regional trend