UK house prices have strongest year since 2006, but likely to slow in 2022 – Business Live | Business

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UK house prices posted their strongest year since 2006, thanks to higher demand, tax breaks for stamp duty and a shortage of homes on the market.

Lender Nationwide reports that annual home price growth rose to 10.4% in December, versus 10.0% in November. This is the fastest growth in a calendar year since 2006.

Prices jumped 1% in December. The typical UK home price is now at £254,822 for the first time on the Nationwide Index. This is an increase of nearly £24,000 over the course of the year; Largest rise seen in one year in monetary terms.

Nationwide house price index Photo: Nationwide

Prices are now 16% higher than they were before the pandemic in early 2020, says Robert Gardner, chief economist at Nationwide.

Demand has remained strong in recent months, although the stamp duty holiday ended at the end of September.

Mortgage approvals for home purchases continued to rise above pre-pandemic levels, despite the increase in activity seen earlier in the year. In fact, in the first 11 months of 2021, the total number of real estate transactions was almost 30% higher than the same period in 2019.

At the same time, the home inventory in the market remained very low throughout the year, which contributed to the strong pace of price growth.

Separate data from Halifax overnight showed that a “race for space” among homebuyers has sent prices up in some UK cities by nearly a fifth this year, with Taunton topping the list of areas with the biggest increases.

As the day comes

European stock markets are poised for a weak start, as the surge in Omicron issues weighs on investors.

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European Opening Calls: #FTSE 7412 -0.11% #DAX 15842 -0.07% #CAC 7161 0.00% #AEX 797 +0.14% #MIB 27353 +0.03% #IBEX 8668 -0.07% #OMX 2420 +0.06% #SMI 12932 +0.04 %# STOXX 4289 + 0.09% # IGOpeningCall

December 30, 2021

Yesterday, Britain’s FTSE 100 index hit a 22-month high, finally returning to its pre-crash levels in February 2020 as trading resumed after the Christmas holidays.

On Wall Street, the S&P 500 hit a record 70 close in 2021 as the traditional Santa Rally index lifted stocks.

Naim Aslam from Avatrade says:

US futures are trading flat, while those in Europe are down, and major stock market indices are on track to end the year on a good note. Investors are delighted that Santa Claus has blessed the markets this year, allowing the Dow and S&P 500 to close yesterday’s session at all-time highs.

Overall, investors are thrilled that we are ending 2021 on a high note after a grueling 2020. Although the emergence of the Omicron variant initially worried investors, the situation is now likely to be under control thanks to the COVID-19 super-vaccination and a better understanding of the virus.

However, the Federal Reserve’s gradual reduction of quantitative easing measures to keep inflation in check could be a major factor driving volatility in stock markets in 2022.

The latest weekly US jobless claims data for 2021 will show the health of the US labor market.

7am GMT: Nationwide House Price Index at 8am GMT: Spanish inflation data at 1.30pm GMT: US weekly unemployment data.

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