UK house prices fall for fourth month in a row - ONS

UK house prices fell for the fourth month in a row in March, according to data released on Wednesday by the Office for National Statistics.

House prices declined by 1.2% on the month following a 0.1% drop in February.

On the year, meanwhile, growth eased to 4.1% in March from an upwardly-revised 5.8% the month before, coming in below consensus expectations of 4.5% growth.

The average UK house price was £285,000 in March, up £11,000 on a year earlier, but down £8,000 from the recent peak in November 2022.

Gabriella Dickens, senior UK economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said: "The housing market continued to struggle in March, as affordability issues dampened buyer demand. The official measure of house prices fell for the fourth month in a row, leaving prices 2.6% below their November peak.

"The data showed that house prices have tended to fall the most in regions that have seen the sharpest increases over the past three years. For instance, prices in the North West jumped by 33% between January 2020 and November 2022, but have fallen by 3.3% over the last five months, more than the UK average. Nonetheless, on a year-over-year basis, London remains an outlier, with prices rising by just 1.5% - the smallest regional increase - due to the fact that affordability already was stretched prior to the jump in house prices over the past couple of years."