Government statistics revealed first-time buyers in particular felt the benefits with the vast majority of sales outside of London and at prices well below the national average.

Over 80% of Help to Buy sales were to first-time buyers helping 54,000 onto the property ladder.

The North West has the highest take up for the mortgage guarantee scheme while the equity loan scheme, which focuses solely on new-build properties, has seen the greatest success in the east and south east of the country.

Leeds council is the highest performing local authority across the country for the two parts of Help to Buy – with almost 1,000 new homes secured by its residents.

The average house price under the scheme is £186,000; £156,000 for mortgage guarantee and £211,000 under the equity loan scheme – all of which are well below the UK average house price of £273,000.

The average house price to income multiple under the mortgage guarantee scheme is just over 3.5 times salary and capped at a 4.5 times ratio to ensure responsible lending.

Figures for the mortgage guarantee scheme also showed completions have been least concentrated in regions where house price growth is highest, for instance in London the scheme makes up just 1% of all mortgage lending compared to an average of 3% across the country.

Brian Murphy, head of lending at Mortgage Advice Bureau (MAB), said: “The equity loan scheme alone has supported 35,962 property sales in its first 19 months and our analysis shows consumers using the Help to Buy 1 scheme are able to purchase with just £15,479 of their own deposit funding thanks to the government’s 20% contribution.

“Lloyds recently increased its Help to Buy lending limit, and the continued backing of this scheme and higher loan-to-value lending by the UK’s major lenders will be crucial to keep the door open to first-time buyers.”

The scheme came under fire last month from business secretary Vince Cable who said it was not helping people to buy because it was pushing up prices.