Housebuilder Taylor Wimpey moved back into the black in the first half as it benefited from a stable housing market.
Pete Redfern, the chief executive, described the first six months of the year as "transformational" with the sale of the company's North American division and progress towards a double-digit operating margin target in the UK.
The company, which was formed from the merger of Taylor Woodrow and George Wimpey in 2007 and is Britain's second-largest housebuilder by volume, made a pre-tax profit of £28.9m compared with a loss of £2.3m a year ago.
"We are well aware of the wider global and national uncertainty, but the UK housing market has been remarkably stable," said Redfern. "There is very good underlying demand. There are lots of people who would happily buy a house if they could get a mortgage."
He expects this stability to continue for the rest of the year, and identified the scarcity of mortgages as the biggest constraint. But despite the gloomy economic picture, housebuilders need not worry unduly while the chronic lack of housing in the UK persists.
Housebuilders are chasing profit margins rather than volumes. Taylor Wimpey, which builds mainly attached houses with two to three bedrooms and focuses on south east England, completed 4,707 homes in the first six months of the year against 4,804 homes in the same period last year. The average selling price remained flat at £168,000.
The group has sold its North American arm to property investor TMM Holdings for £730m to focus on the UK, which helped it slash debt from £2bn three years ago to £160m. It has a small loss making business in Spain where it built 30 homes during the first half.