LONDON (Alliance News) - Building and property development company Abbey PLC Thursday reported an increase in profit for the full year, boosted by the UK government's mortgage-financing scheme.
Abbey reported pretax profit of EUR24.1 million for the year ended April 30, up from EUR11.3 million a year earlier, as revenue rose to EUR99.3 million from EUR84.4 million.
It said trading in the UK was "good" during the year, with buoyant sales supported by the UK government's Help-to-Buy scheme.
The first phase of Help to Buy in England started in April 2013, making buyers of newly built homes eligible for a 20% equity loan from the government on top of their 5% deposit. The scheme has been extended until 2020 from its original 2016 end date. The second phase, which started in the autumn of 2013, guarantees a portion of a buyer's mortgage of new and existing homes and hasn't so far been extended beyond its current end date of 2016.
The company said its housebuilding arm completed 390 sales up from 368 a year earlier. The majority of which took place in the UK, with 22 in Ireland and 15 in the Czech Republic.
Overall, rental income rose to EUR844,000 from EUR768,000 a year earlier.
At the year end, the UK division owned and controlled land with planning permission for 1,320 plots, up from 1,130 plots a year earlier.
In total, including Ireland and the Czech Republic, at the year end the group owned and controlled land with planning permission for the supply of 1,858 plots, compared with 1,871 plots a year earlier.
Abbey increased its dividend to 6 euro cents per share from 5 cents, making a total dividend of 9 cents compared with 8 cents a year earlier.
Abbey shares were quoted down 2.4% at 866.33 pence Thursday.
By Anthony Tshibangu; anthonytshibangu@alliancenews.com; @AnthonyAllNews
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