‘Surprise bounce’ in house prices
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7977683.stm
House prices rose in March for the first time since October 2007, according to the Nationwide.
The building society said that property prices increased by 0.9% compared with the previous month.
That reduced the annual rate of house price falls from 17.6% in February to 15.7% in March, with the average UK home costing £150,946.
Nationwide described the change as a "surprise bounce" and warned against concluding the market had turned.
"While the rise in prices in March is welcome, it is far too soon to see this as evidence that the trough of the market has been reached," said Fionnuala Earley, Nationwide's chief economist.
She added that cuts in interest rates and the Bank of England's move to expand the amount of money in the system - known as quantitative easing - would take time to work through into the housing market before there was a "sustained" recovery in house prices.
Nationwide's guarded comments on reading too much into the monthly figures are backed up by the three-month on three-month data, often seen as better indicator of underlying price trends.
