UK house price decline slows down
UK House prices continued their descent in March, although they fell more slowly in the first three months of this year than they did in the last quarter of 2008, the latest official data show.
House prices in London in March showed the biggest single year-on-year decline of any region, falling 15.7 per cent, well above the national average. Measured by housing type, prices of flats nationwide fell by 1.9 per cent while those of detached houses fell by 1.6 per cent in March. Bungalows, however, saw average prices rise in March by 0.4 per cent.
The average price paid by first time buyers across the whole of the UK was £133,535 in March while the average price paid by former owner-occupiers was £220,235.
According to the Department for Communities and Local Government, UK house prices in March were 13.6 per cent below their levels of one year earlier, with the prices paid for flats showing the steepest fall. In the three months through March, house prices fell an average of 3.8 per cent compared with a decline of 6.4 per cent in the three months through December.
Although the absolute level of decline differs from that seen in the FT House Price Index as well as that seen in indices produced by lenders Nationwide and Halifax, the overall trend of all indices show broadly the same picture.
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