While a previous report Realty Today covered earlier this week showed an increase in home sales and mortgage lending ahead of the stamp duty implementation on April 1, new data revealed that home prices fell across the country.
As reported by The Telegraph, the Land Registry house price indices, considered as the most credible, showed that house prices in the country, except London and the East, fell in March. England and Wales both saw an overall 0.5 percent decline in house prices last month while Yorkshire and Humberside recorded that biggest fall at -2.6 percent. West Midlands comes in second with a drop of 2 percent, followed by the North East with 1.2 percent.
Further to the report, the Land Registry also revealed a 5.4 percent fall in completed home sales in January in England and Wales from a year earlier. This is contrary to what many have expected to happen in relation to the 3 percent stamp duty that was announced in December 2014.
The drop in figures is of concern to some real estate market players as it could be a sign of the sector's downturn. The Telegraph quoted Jeremy Leaf, former chairman of the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors, saying, "A decline in number of property transactions continues to be a worry, as if people aren't able to move in and out of the market when they want to, there will be an inevitable knock-on effect for the rest of the economy."
Uncertainties brought about the EU referendum and the prospect of Brexit are also a factor that causes property owners, developers and sellers to slow down in their activities. Experts expect house prices growth to slow down in the coming months and the housing market activity to gain only a limited momentum in the second half of the year.
