U.K.'s Help to Buy Seen Stoking London Property Values: Chart

(Bloomberg) -- The U.K. government's decision to expand its Help to Buy program is drawing criticism because it may stimulate London's property market again. Unless supply improves, the effect of the program is to increase home values and transfer “real assets to the wealthy or, in this case, the relatively wealthier,” said Paul Cheshire, a professor of economic geography at the London School of Economics and Political Science. It's irresponsible to be encouraging first-time buyers into the U.K. capital's “overpriced market” via the program, said Neal Hudson, founder of research firm Residential Analysts Ltd.

To contact the reporter on this story: Neil Callanan in London at ncallanan@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Neil Callanan at ncallanan@bloomberg.net, Andrew Blackman, Jon Menon