BARRATT Developments, one of Britain's biggest housebuilders, has said the property market is getting back to normal after a blockbuster year when its profits more than doubled.

The company has also reassured investors that its Scottish business will continue to operate as normal whatever the outcome of next week's referendum.

Barratt sold 14,838 homes in the year to the end of June, over 1,000 more than the previous year.

Each property changed hands for an average of £219,900, up 12.9 per cent on last year's average price and driven by inflation in the housing market as well as Barratt's shift towards building larger homes.

The firm said almost a third of its customers in the year used Help to Buy, the UK government programme that enables buyers to move on or up the property ladder by guaranteeing a portion of their mortgage.

More than 18,500 houses were sold in the UK through Help to Buy in the nine months to the end of June, 2,300 of which were located in Scotland, according to government figures.

The company said demand is set to remain strong, but added that it was seeing "a return to more normal seasonal trends following exceptionally high levels of activity" after Help to Buy was introduced in April 2013.

The company bought 21,478 plots for future construction during the year, taking its spending to £3.8bn since it returned to buying land in 2009.

Barratt bought about 18 per cent of this land from public sector owners.

Construction has accelerated so much throughout the country that Barratt found itself paying more for bricks, timber and skilled labour during the year.

About eight per cent of Barratt's business is based in Scotland, said chief executive Mark Clare during a presentation in the City yesterday.

"We run it already as a separate business - every region of the UK is different, as you might imagine.

"It has its own management team and interestingly it has its own regulatory environment, its own product types - it is a very, very different market.

"So we are not sure we would see any different if we saw a Yes vote and we think the impact on the overall business is tiny, whatever the outcome of the vote."

Barratt said sales and prices were improving across all of its British regional businesses.

Overall pre-tax profits in the year to June 30 soared 103 per cent to £390.6m, on revenues that were up 21.1 per cent to £3.16 billion.

Barratt announced that it plans to return £950m to its shareholders over the next three years, starting with a dividend hike from 2.5p to 10.3p, which will be paid out on November 20.

Shares in Barratt rose 2.8 per cent to 377.4p yesterday, making the company the second-biggest riser on the FTSE 100.

However, the shares have fallen 12 per cent in the last six months, and Barratt is due to be relegated to the FTSE 250 later this month.

"Commentary on current trading is positive with the group reporting only a small decline in the private sales rate over the summer against exceptionally tough comparatives and positive pricing dynamics," said analysts from stockbroker Numis yesterday.

"We retain our positive stance and argue that Barratt, and the sector in general, remain too cheap."