Housing market at it’s weakest in London and South East according to RICS
The latest RICS UK Residential Market Survey – March 2018 released today reveals that momentum in the UK housing market continues to slow, as buyer demand falls for the twelfth consecutive month.
Agreed sales and new buyer enquiries continue to slip at the national level, the national price indicator remains flat, weighed down by London and the South East, according to the RICS survey report.
The survey reveals that: regionally there continues to be significant variation in the house price indicator with London exhibiting the weakest feedback. Respondents in the South East, East Anglia and the North East, also reported prices to be falling but to a lesser extent than in the capital. Meanwhile, prices continue to drift higher across all other parts of the UK, with Northern Ireland, Wales and the East Midlands seeing the strongest readings.
Simon Rubinsohn, RICS Chief Economist said:
“The latest RICS results provide little encouragement that the drop in housing market activity is likely to be reversed anytime soon. Apart from the implications this has for the market itself, it also has the potential to impact the wider economy contributing to a softer trend in household spending. This could make Bank of England deliberations around a May hike in interest rates, which is pretty much odds-on at the moment, a little more finely balanced than would otherwise be the case. The downshift in sales for the time being continues to be more visible in London and the South East with many other parts of the country continuing to show rather greater resilience. Feedback on expectations regarding transactions suggest this divergence will persist over the coming months.”
Read the RICS UK Residential Market Survey – March 2018 in full click here.
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