House prices rose 9 per cent year-on-year in the three months to August, says Halifax.
Annual growth in August was lower than June’s 9.6 per cent but higher than last month’s 7.8 per cent.
On a monthly basis, the average price was up 2.7 per cent to £204,674.
Halifax housing economist Martin Ellis says: “The underlying pace of house price growth is strong. The shortage of secondhand properties for sale on the market is resulting in upward pressure on house prices. At the same time, economic recovery, real earnings growth and very low mortgage rates are supporting housing demand. Strengthening demand and highly constrained supply are likely to mean that house price growth continues to be robust in the short-term.”
Legal & General Mortgage Club director Stephen Smith says: “The increase in house prices in August compared to the same period last year shows the sheer scale of the rift between supply and demand. This imbalance is causing houses prices to climb in months that typically see less activity in the market. This trend is likely to continue in the long-term unless more houses are built so that there are enough homes available for people to buy.
“The country needs to develop a long-term solution to this issue to stop house price growth from exceeding inflation and earnings growth. The longer this continues, the more people it will push out of the market.”
I guess house prices and therefore valuations are going to fluctuate dependant on area and also based on the opinion of the surveyor on the day.
I am still seeing fairly large discrepancies from one surveyor to another. The great pity is that this can never be challenged. One recent example of this was a BTL Re Mortgage were the surveyor down valued from £80,000 to £74,000. Given that this was a Santander case and they have a minimum valuation of £75,000 on a BTL the case was declined. The second lender agreed with the clients opinion and duly valued it at £80,000. The BDM for Santander wasn’t best pleased, but until they remove the inability to appeal a valuation, they will continue to lose business on this basis.
I cant help but chuckle when I read the lenders reports on house prices when they state these as facts.
We only need to go back 6 weeks or so to early August when Halifax reported house prices were down yet Nationwide reported they were up m/m.
Only two weeks ago Nationwide reported annual house price growth had slowed to 3.2% yet here Halifax have this improving to 9%…. Looking at the August report form Academetrics with LSL it seems Nationwide are nearer the mark than Halifax with annual growth at 3.7%. Their September report has just landed reporting annual growth at 4.1%.
Of course the summer anomalies can play a part here as can lender appetite and mortgage pricing but its good to see the longer term reports showing steady growth again across more regions.
I wonder whether we could see Halifax having more lenience then on valuations going forward? They certainly seem to have a higher expectation of higher property values….