<p><span>Taylor Wimpey’s half year completions were ahead of expectations, but with the continuing market challenges its profit fell almost 43%. </span><span></span></p> <p><span>Reporting on the six months ending July 2, the volume housebuilder hailed a “resilient” first half. It achieved 5,082</span> <span>completions (excluding joint ventures). However, these were still 25.2% lower than H1 2022. </span></p> <p><span>Pre-tax profit dropped to £237.7 million from last year’s £414.5 million. Revenue decreased 21.2% to £1,637.1 million, with its operating profit margin falling from 20.4% to 14.4% as house price inflation failed to fully counter build cost inflation.</span></p> <p><span>During the period, the volume housebuilder delivered a net private sales rate of 0.71 against H1 2022’s 0.90. Excluding bulk deals, this was 0.62 (H1 2022: 0.88).</span></p> <p><span>Private average selling prices rose 8.6% to £366,000, reflecting house price inflation and “positive mix impacts”.</span></p> <p><span>Taylor Wimpey said that it had been trading against a “variable market backdrop”, with an encouraging start to the year as demand recovered from the lows of Q4 2022 and mortgage rates stabilised. </span></p> <p><span>But the market “weakened” in the second quarter as the Bank of England raised interest rates in response to higher than expected inflation. The business said it was supporting customers through …