House Prices Fall Again

The Nationwide, the biggest building society in the UK, has reported falling house prices for the third month in a row.

It said that after December's 0.4% drop, January's drop was 0.1% - better than had been predicted by analysts at 0.3%.

This reduced the annual house price inflation from 4.8% in December to 4.2% in January, the lowest it has been since December 2005. This drop reduced the average house selling price by £1,607 to £184,473.

Looking at quarterly figures, prices fell 0.3% in the three months to January in contrast to a 0.9% increase in the three months to December.

These drops, along with yesterday's announcement by the Bank of England that mortgage approvals had dropped to their lowest level for 13 years, are making analysts to predict a quarter percent drop in base rates next week.