The average cost of a UK home passed \u00a3300,000 for the first time in January, as house prices increased at the fastest rate since November 2024.<\/p>\n
Data released by Halifax showed that house prices rose 0.7% month on month last month, the fastest rate since a 1.1% increase was recorded in November 2024. On an annual measure, prices grew 1%.<\/p>\n
Halifax, which is part of Lloyds \u2013 Britain\u2019s biggest mortgage lender \u2013 estimates that the average price of a UK home hit a record \u00a3300,077.<\/p>\n
However, Nationwide, which also releases monthly estimates on house prices, puts the average cost of a home at a much lower \u00a3270,873<\/a>.<\/p>\n The growth marks a significant bounceback after a sluggish run-up to Christmas, when the average price of a UK home fell by 0.5% month on month<\/a>. Halifax has revised this figure down from 0.2%.<\/p>\n \u201cThe housing market entered 2026 on a steady footing,\u201d said Amanda Bryden, the head of mortgages at Halifax. \u201cWhile [\u00a3300,000] is undoubtedly a milestone figure, and activity levels show a resilient market, affordability remains a challenge for many would-be buyers. All in all, we still think house prices are likely to edge up between 1% and 3% this year.\u201d<\/p>\n Last month, Nationwide predicted that the average UK house price would rise by between 2% and 4% this year.<\/a><\/p>\n Homebuyers have been buoyed up by a string of cuts to the base rate by the Bank of England\u2019s monetary policy committee, with the most recent coming in December<\/a>.<\/p>\n On Thursday, the bank maintained the rate at 3.75%<\/a> over concerns of persistent inflation, which rose for the first time in five months in December, to 3.4%<\/a>.<\/p>\n However, the narrow 5-4 vote split has led analysts to factor in further cuts in the coming months. The committee has cut rates six times since mid-2024.<\/p>\n On a regional basis Northern Ireland continues to show the strongest house price in the UK, with average prices rising at 5.9% annually to \u00a3217,206.<\/p>\n In Scotland, the rate of growth is running at 5.4%, with the average price of a property at \u00a3221,711. In Wales, there has been only 0.5% annual growth, with the average home costing \u00a3228,415.<\/p>\n In England, the strongest growth is in the north-west, at 2.1%, where an average home costs \u00a3244,329.<\/p>\n \u201cLooking ahead, much will depend on whether the expected rate cuts later this year materialise,\u201d said Karen Noye, a mortgage expert at Quilter. \u201cIf they do, the impact is more likely to be gradual support for affordability rather than a sudden jump in prices.<\/p>\n \u201cStability has returned, but enthusiasm has not and that is likely to keep price growth contained over the months ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n Anthony Codling, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, said: \u201cWhile housing affordability is stretched for many, rising wages, falling mortgage rates and the easing of mortgage lending limits have all contributed to rising house prices at a national level.\u201d<\/p>\n While the average price of a UK property has topped the \u00a3300,000 mark for the first time, in part fuelled by sharp rises during the Covid pandemic, growth in recent years has been modest.<\/p>\n Property prices have risen by 5.7%, or about \u00a316,000, over the last three years as higher interest rates and affordability issues have contributed to slower growth.<\/p>\n However, between 2020 and 2023 house prices climbed almost 19%, over \u00a344,000, as ultra-low borrowing costs and the pandemic-driven \u201crace for space\u201d led to homeowners looking to relocate.<\/p>\n There are a number of factors that contribute to the difference in average UK house price estimates produced by Nationwide and Halifax.<\/p>\n Both produce the estimates based on their own mortgage approvals, about 15,000 a month for Halifax and 12,000 for Nationwide.<\/p>\n Cash transactions are also not included, with 30% to 40% of sales in cash. Nationwide also does not include buy-to-let transactions.e<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The average cost of a UK home passed \u00a3300,000 for the first time in January, as house prices…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277026,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[114,184,85,46],"class_list":{"0":"post-277025","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-economy","10":"tag-il","11":"tag-israel"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277025","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277025"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277025\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}