Latest News

House prices rose unexpectedly in March according to the Nationwide, although prices across the UK remain nearly 16 per cent lower than a year ago.  In Strathclyde, price falls have been limited to 10 per cent or less depending on area.

Prices rose by almost one per cent (0.9 per cent) last month, the first time that the Nationwide has recorded an increase since October 2007.  The rise slowed the annual fall in prices from 17.6 per cent to 15.7 per cent.  But the nationwide said that it would be unwise to draw strong conclusions from the slowdown in the annual rate of fall.

The Nationwide's analysis of the first quarter of the year, from January to March, saw prices continuing to fall across the UK, although Scotland remained the most resilient part of the country.  Fionnuala Earley, Nationwide's Chief Economist, said: "Scotland is still experiencing the slowest annual rate of decline in house price across the UK. On this measure, Scotland has now been the best performing part of the UK for five consecutive quarters".

Nevertheless, the lender, Britain's biggest building society, said that the pace of fall in prices in Scotland in the first three months of 2009 picked up significantly.  An analysis of the results for all of Scotland show, however, that the west of Scotland fared better than most of the country.  That would be consistent with GSPC's latest report on the market http://www.gspc.co.uk/news/latest-gspc-house-price-report which shows the pace of price falls in west central Scotland moderating in the last few months.

The Nationwide figures suggest that prices in Glasgow and South Lanarkshire have been broadly stable since the start of this year and the fall in prices in Dumbartonshire and North Lanarkshire as well as Renfrewshire and Inverclyde seems to have slowed.

Commenting on the Nationwide house price data, Simon Rubinsohn, RICS chief economist said: "The first monthly increase in prices since October 2007 comes on the back of Bank of England figures showing a sharp increase in mortgage approvals in February.  Both of these developments reflect improvements in key series contained in the RICS monthly Housing Market survey. Alongside the pick-up in the 'new buyer enquiries' series since November, there has more recently been a modest upturn in the closely watched sales to stock ratio which has historically been a good lead indicator of price trends".