The average price of a property in the UK stood at £220,094 in April, the Land Registry/ONS have reported.
The figure was £3,000 or 1.6% up on the month before, and £12,000 or 5.6% up on April last year.
However, it is totally at odds with Rightmove’s latest asking price for properties coming new to the market, which for May stood at £317,281 – a gap of nearly £100,000.
There were other huge gaps in house prices, depending on where you are in the UK.
According to the Land Registry/ONS, house prices varied across the different countries: in England the average was £236,519; in Northern Ireland £124,007; in Scotland £145,735; and in Wales £147,921.
The highest English house prices were in London, averaging £482,779, and the lowest in the north-east at £123,234.
The Land Registry referred to official data which says April’s transactions were 20.3% up on the same month last year, when the market slowed drastically after the 3% Stamp Duty surcharge was brought in on the purchase of second properties.
However, the Land Registry itself gives transaction figures for February – the latest month for which data is available.
These show year-on-year slumps everywhere in the UK apart from Scotland, where there were 5,662 transactions, up 2.8% on February last year.
In England there were 52,883 transactions, down 18.2%; in Northern Ireland there were 4,379 transactions, down 28.5%; and in Wales there were 2,908 transactions, down 8.8%.
Separately, the Council of Mortgage Lenders has reported that home buyers took out 51,200 house purchase loans in April, down 14% on the previous month.
First-time buyers accounted for about half the borrowers, taking out 25,400 loans, down 18% month on month.
Buy-to-let borrowers took out 5,300 house purchase loans, down 21% on a monthly basis.
The Bank of England has also reported a fall in residential mortgage activity.
It said that £60.4bn of new residential loans was advanced during the first quarter of this year. This was down 3.8% on the previous quarter and down 5.6% on the same quarter last year.
Not comparing eggs with eggs here.
Land Registry figures are based on completions and represent prices that were agreed months earlier, in some case that could be 6 months or even longer..
Rightmove prices are current asking prices which will in most cases be negotiated down.
In addition Rightmove’s asking prices will be distorted by the plethora of vastly overpriced property that’s never going to sell from delusional sellers or even more likely, stuff vastly overvalued by online agents to get the instruction because they don’t care whether it sells or not, they’ve got the money!
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