Manchester Monitor: Property driving city economy

The March 2015 edition of New Economy's Manchester Monitor, a snapshot of the city-region's latest economic indicators, has majored on the impact of the property market, with office, residential and hotel data all up on last year.

Headline figures show office take-up increased by 67.8% since January 2014, house prices were up by 4.1% with the average house in Greater Manchester now costing £108,409, and hotel occupancy was 67.6% on a weekday and reached 97% in January when Manchester City and Manchester United FC played at home.

At Manchester Airport, passenger numbers increased by 6% to 22m people over the 12 months, an additional 1.2m on 2013.

The report highlighted that the 4.1% house price increase is lower than the 6.7% growth national average seen in England and Wales. All Greater Manchester local authorities saw an increase, other than prices in Tameside which dropped 0.7%, and Bolton by 2.9%.

The Manchester Monitor also said that Greater Manchester's Local Enterprise Partnership area was the fastest growing economy in the country in 2013, with GVA growth of 4.6%, around £2.5 billion, exceeding both London's GVA growth of 4.0% and 4.3% in Birmingham.

John Holden, director of research at New Economy, said: "There are many encouraging economic indicators emerging from this month's Manchester Monitor -office space take-up and hotel occupancy are both especially buoyant and the labour market is performing well. Coupled with the major investments aimed at strengthening economic growth that Greater Manchester has recently secured, 2015 has started off on a very strong footing to maintain and enhance this growth trajectory."

To see the Manchester Monitor, click here

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