Halifax reports rising house prices

House prices rose by 1.2 per cent last month, more than was expected, the Halifax said today.

But Nationwide stated House prices are likely to fall in the first half of 2006, with price growth becoming virtually stagnant by the end of next year, Britain's biggest building society the Nationwide warned today.


Martin Ellis, the Halifax chief economist, said: "The high level of employment and good earnings growth continues to underpin housing demand."

The third significant increase reported in four months by Britain’s largest mortgage lender caused its measure of annual house price inflation to rise back up to 4.5 per cent in the three months to November from 3.9 per cent in the three months to October. The index hit a nine-year low of 2.3 per cent in the three months to July.

The average price of a British home was a seasonally-adjusted £170,086 in November.

Howard Archer, chief UK economist at Global Insight said: "The Halifax data will undoubtedly increase speculation that the recent clear pick up in housing market activity and buyer interest is starting to feed through to revive house prices."

However, the Halifax said that a slowdown in economic growth in the UK, coupled with the still relatively high house price-to-earnings ratio, was likely to act as a brake on further price inflation.

Earlier this week, Nationwide reported reported house prices to be flat month-on-month in November and up just 2.4 per cent year-on-year.

"Not only is mortgage activity still well below recent past peak levels, but most affordability ratios are still stretched and will become more so if house prices start moving back up markedly," Mr Archer said.

"If house prices start to accelerate markedly, we believe buyer interest will soon diminish, thereby keeping a lid on prices."

Halifax added that, in line with solid mortgage lending figures released by the Bank of England earlier this week, Halifax Estate Agents have seen a rise in sales in recent months with sales higher than a year earlier for the first time this year in October.

Having claimed an 8.7 per cent share of mortgage lending at this point last year, the Nationwide made gross loan advances of £10.8 billion in the first half of 2005 to end up with a market share of 7.3 per cent.

In life assurance and investments, the Nationwide claimed 4.9 per cent of the market for ISA sales - up from 3.8 per cent last year.

In banking and consumer lending, it bumped up personal loan advances by 29 per cent to £701 million

This release was published on openPR.