Annual house prices continue to fall, say March reports

The latest batch of house price reports show nationwide average prices stagnating, while the north-south divide continues.

All of the major house price and asking price reports for March 2012 have now been released.

Halifax says that, on average, UK property prices have fallen by 0.6% since last March, although first-time buyers rushing to beat the Stamp Duty exemption deadline meant prices rose by 2.2% on February.

However, Halifax’s average house price is at £163,803, almost identical to what it was in July last year.

The bank said it expects “little overall movement in prices this year provided that the UK economy does not suffer a pronounced weakening".

Meanwhile, Nationwide says prices are 0.9% lower than they were a year ago. However, it didn’t record the month-on-month bounce in prices that Halifax did, instead saying that prices fell by 1%.

Nationwide's figures suggest that first-time buyers had already bought before March to ensure they beat the Stamp Duty deadline. It commented that “the reintroduction of Stamp Duty [for first-time buyers] is likely to pose a further headwind to housing market activity”.

Nationwide’s average house price is now £163,327. It shares Halifax’s long-term outlook that prices will move “sideways or modestly lower over the next twelve months”.

Nationwide’s regional report for the first quarter of 2012 shows that prices in the south are rising while prices in most regions of the north are falling compared to the same period a year ago.

*North Bedfordshire, West Berkshire, North Buckinghamshire, Hampshire, Oxfordshire, East and South-West Sussex

**South Bedfordshire, East Berkshire, South Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, Kent, Surrey and North-West Sussex

Asking prices keep rising in the south

Elsewhere, property website rightmove says asking prices in England and Wales rose again in March and are now 2.2% higher than in March last year. The average asking price is now £236,939.

But a closer look at the regions again highlights the contrasts between the south of England and elsewhere. London saw the biggest increase in asking prices, up 7.3% on March last year. It is the Midlands and Wales where asking prices are falling most, with prices in the West Midlands down by 2.9%, prices in the East Midlands down by 2.2% and prices in Wales down by 1%.

It says that more people are looking at homes, with search activity on its website up by 16% so far in 2012 and it too feels the end of the Stamp Duty exemption for first-time buyers could see activity fall.

Lastly, property analyst Hometrack says the average time a property in England and Wales is on the market fell in March to 9.7 weeks, compared to 10.2 in January. However, there are huge fluctuations within this overall figure, as the average time a property’s on the market in London is less than six weeks, rising to 11.6 weeks in the Midlands and north of England.

The percentage of the asking price achieved rose from 92.5% in January to 93% in March. Again, this is highest in London and it’s lowest in the north-east and north-west of England.

Hometrack says there are more properties on the market than there were at the start of the year, but still fewer than in recent years, which is helping to prop prices up to some degree.

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