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House prices fell by an average of 1.3% over the course of 2011, mortgage lender Halifax have stated. The monthly house price index from the bank found that a drop of 0.9% in December’s house prices lowered the average value to £160,063.
This marks a 0.1% downward shift on December 2010’s house prices. Last year proved to be a mixed bag for the housing market as there were six monthly falls, five increases and one month’s prices remained unchanged. Despite the instability and turbulence of the housing market, Halifax believes that the market has been ‘surprisingly resilient’ over the past 12 months. Yet the conditions of the housing market have remained broadly unchanged since November 2010 as the number of sold properties to unsold properties has been fairly balanced. There has, however, been a slight increase in the number of properties sold. The number of sales in November 2011 was the highest since December 2009. Despite this minor improvement, the total sales in the first 11 months of 2011 were 2.5% lower than on the same period in 2010. Martin Ellis, Housing Economist, said; "House prices in the final quarter of 2011 were 0.1% lower than in the previous quarter. This compared with a 0.1% rise between Quarter 2 (April to June) and Quarter 3 (July to September). On a monthly basis, prices fell by 0.9% between November and December.” "Whilst there was a modest fall overall in prices during 2011 with an annual decline of 1.3% in December, house prices held up well last year in the face of the difficult and deteriorating economic climate and substantial pressure on households' finances.” Nationwide’s monthly house price index found that the average property price has increased by 1% over the course of 2012, yet prices did fall in December by 0.2%. They claim that the average price of a home is now £163,822. Compare mortgages with Money Expert.
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