Confidence is “slowly returning to the UK housing market” as average sale prices rise to “a level first seen in February 2022”, analysis from e.surv has revealed.
The analysis from surveyors E.serv showed that, in March 2024, the average house sale price using cash and/or mortgages in England and Wales rose by £200, or 0.1 per cent, to £361,368.
While E.surv director, Richard Sexton, described this movement as “muted”, he added there were reports of a “market in slow recovery”.
“Certainly the balance of purchase against re-financing appears to be changing,” he added.
Sexton said the growing confidence is in large part a result of wage growth and a belief that interest rates will ease over the coming months.
“The chronic undersupply continues to support prices but there are now more products available to buyers than there have been for some months,” he added.
“Ultimately, affordability pressures are expected to ease but buyers cannot afford to throw caution to the wind.”
The analysis found the average house price has hovered around the £361,000 mark for the past four months.
It additionally pointed out that the average price in March 2024 is around £46,000, or 15 per cent, higher than at the start of the pandemic in March 2020.
Meanwhile, the annual change in prices in March amounted to a fall of 3.1 per cent, £11,700 less than March 2023.
This represented a fall on the peak of August 2022 when the annual rate of price growth reached a rate of 12.7 per cent.
However, the analysis pointed out the reduction in growth rates has been slowing since September 2023, with an uptick in these rates in both February and March 2024.
The decline in the growth rate in house prices largely corresponds to the period when mortgage interest rates in England and Wales were increasing on a near monthly basis.
tom.dunstan@ft.com
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