Nationwide Building Society, along with others, publish their house price data each month. This enables us to track trends in home values.
The Nationwide are a significant index to follow as one of the biggest UK mortgage lenders as their stats are based upon recent mortgage applications and take account of the price of related home purchases across the country.
This month’s data, for April 2020, demonstrates strong numbers with annual house prices up 3.7% and month on month prices rising by 0.7%. The annualised figures represent the fastest growth since February 2017.
The average house now costs £222,915.
Isn’t this remarkable considering that we are in the middle of lockdown? Yes, you’d think so however 80% of the data that Nationwide analysed this time round is from house purchases that were initiated before lockdown. It will be telling how next month’s numbers look and indeed those from the Halifax too which are out in a week or so.
But, the fundamentals here show that the property market was strong going into the pandemic and that if unemployment is kept in check and mortgage lenders continue to lend without huge restrictions, we won’t see a house price crash and these numbers help support that view.
