2012 review: Property is unmoved Getting the housing market moving again has been a key focus for the UK government this year as it launched an array of stimulus measures - but most have failed to have any significant impact on prices or transaction levels. Last autumn, David Cameron unveiled a strategy designed to "unblock" the housing market by providing mortgages for new-build homes to help up to 100,000 people on to the property ladder. The scheme, dubbed "NewBuy" and launched in March, offers buyers access to 95 per cent mortgages if they are purchasing a newly-built house or flat up to the value of £500,000, by providing mortgage lenders with an indemnity fund backed by housebuilders and the government. However, the scheme has been slow to take off. It sold just 250 homes in its first four months, despite the aim to help up to 100,000 people move by 2015. Recent figures from the Home Builders Federation suggest that about 2,200 people have now reserved homes through NewBuy since its launch in March. Five months later, the government launched Funding for Lending (FLS), a scheme aimed at lowering banks" funding costs and improving lending to households and small businesses. There are some signs that this government scheme, along with lower wholesale funding costs, has had greater success. Mortgage rates for new borrowers have fallen to historic lows this year, particularly for those with big deposits of 40 per cent or more. "The government's Funding for Lending scheme is working to drive down costs resulting in very low mortgage rates, some of which are over longer terms," says John Wilcock, head of mortgages at The Post Office. According to the Council of Mortgage Lenders, 2012 will go down as year of "continuing slow - but welcome - recovery." Based on data for the first nine months of the year, mortgage approvals for house purchases have edged up by about 6 per cent in 2012. Despite the launch of schemes targeted at boosting housing transactions, first-time buyers have continued to find it tough to get on to the property ladder. This has resulted in the private rented sector play a growing role in the UK housing market. Figures from the latest census data support this: the proportion of the UK population living in private rented accommodation has risen from 9 per cent in 2001 to 15 per cent in 2011. While the government focused on trying to stimulate the bottom end of the housing market, it didn't extend much help to its upper echelons. The prime central London market faced significant headwinds this year as the government revealed a series of hard-hitting stamp duty tax measures in March's Budget. The introduction of a new stamp duty rate for buyers of homes worth £2m or more saw wealthy homebuyers rush to seal more than £170m worth of property deals in the hours before the midnight deadline on March 21. Sales of houses worth more than £2m fell by almost a third in the months after the Budget. "The Budget didn't kill the market, but it did take the wind out of its sails, especially in the most international areas, which were most affected," notes Roarie Scarisbrick, partner at buying agent Property Vision. House prices in most areas of the country either stagnated or fell, but London and the Southeast remained fairly resilient. One group that did well from government largesse was housebuilders. Share prices in the sector rose steadily throughout the year, with Persimmon up almost 80 per cent.