Barratt Redrow shares were steady on Wednesday after the house builder released an update for the early stages of 2025 that showed a minor improvement in trading conditions.
Barratt’s release titled ‘Well-positioned for sustainable growth’ showed signs of improvement from a low base and did little to inspire investors or give them any reason to sell the stock.
“Much to investors’ relief, Barratt Redrow has shown that everything’s ticking along nicely in 2025,” said Aarin Chiekrie, equity analyst, Hargreaves Lansdown.
Barratt Redrow shares were 1% higher at the time of writing.
The issues with the UK housing market are well documented and largely priced into housebuilding shares. Like a coiled spring, investors are looking for signs of an improvement that will likely spark a rerate in the sector.
We didn’t quite get that in today’s update from Barratts, but an uptick in sales rates in the early months of 2025 shows things aren’t getting any worse for the sector.
“Being the first UK housebuilder to update markets on performance since the storm of tariff uncertainty and stamp duty changes, Barratt has done well to quell worries for now,” Aarin Chiekrie said.
“Revenue and cost benefits are continuing to build as the integration of Barratt and Redrow is nearing its completion date. And while many peers are seeing moderate levels of build cost inflation, Barratt’s increased scale means it’s been able to keep build costs broadly flat this year.”
The company left its guidance of between 16,800 and 17,200 completions unchanged over the full year.
Touching on the integration of Redrow into the business, the company said it had closed a number of regional offices and was continuing to achieve head office function synergies.