Good news for those of you trying to get on the housing ladder, as stats from Nationwide show that UK house prices have fallen for the third consecutive month. The last time this type of consistent fall in prices was seen was in 2009, at the height of the financial crisis.
The building society have said that these numbers act as further proof that the housing market is 'losing momentum.'
They looked at factors behind the drop including “affordability pressures” in parts of the UK, the recent squeeze on household budgets caused by the weakness of the pound, Brexit, the election and even the idea that these stats could just show a blip rather than a constant trend, it’s too early to tell.
The average price of a home fell to £208,711 between April and May, a 0.2% reduction month on month but overall, they’ve predicted "a small increase in house prices of around 2% is likely over the course of 2017 as a whole”. This prediction comes despite the fact that unemployment has fallen to a 42-year low, and instead focuses on a clear shortage in the supply of housing in the UK. A 2% increase is still 2.5% less than property price rises in 2016, so we guess there’s still something to celebrate about.
Things are generally looking steadier, and despite house prices still being 2.1% higher than at this time last year, when Samuel Tombs, chief UK economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics discussed rates of employment growth, mortgage rates and house prices to the BBC, he said 'the days of surging house prices driven by sharply rising loan-to-income ratios are gone.'
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.