The average UK house price in October was £231,000, says the Office for National Statistics.
The figure was 1.5% up on October the year before and on a ‘seasonally adjusted’ basis was up 0.2% on the previous month – although, mystifyingly, on a ‘not seasonally adjusted’ basis the ONS also reports that September’s average house price, at £133,000, was higher than the previous September.
According to ONS, first-time buyers were paying 1.8% more for a property this October than they did in the same month last year.
The year-on-year increase reflected growth of 1.8% in England and 2.8% in Wales, which were offset by a decline of 2.2% in Scotland and 11.7% in Northern Ireland
Annual house price increases in England were driven by a 3.4% rise in London and a 3.1% increase in Yorkshire and the Humber, says ONS.
It adds that taking London and the South-East out of the figures, UK house prices rose by 0.8% over the year. In October 2012, London’s average house price stood at £388,000.
The North-East had the lowest average house price at £143,000, says the ONS.
London, the South-East and the East of England all had prices higher than the UK average price of £231,000. Excluding London and the South-East, the average UK mix-adjusted house price was £187,000.
Average mix-adjusted house prices in October 2012 stood at £239,000 in England, £159,000 in Wales, £124,000 in Northern Ireland and £176,000 in Scotland, says the ONS.
As usual the ONS figures are wildly at odds with the Land Registry, which reported an average price in England and Wales of £161,605. The Land Registry put the average house price in Wales at £118,215 and in London at £364,574.
There is a big discrepancy is the North-East, where the Land Registry says the average house price in October was £96,061 – a difference of nearly £47,000.
As EAT is weary of pointing out, the Government appears happy to continue to publish two very different, but official, sets of housing data.
We would be interested to get feedback from readers: which statistics do you trust – Land Registry or ONS?
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Comments
Just use rightmove asking prices, thats close enough and about as much use.
It begs the question - ONS.... Why?
No information is better than wrong information.
Thanks for the link EW - really interesting
Yep:
ONS - Data from a sample of completed property sales
LR: The prices paid in residential sales in England and Wales completed during the month
ONS is like an opinion poll before an election! Indicative based upon a small sample
Exactly that Richard. Lies, damn lies and statistics as someone once said.
Well that explains it then. ONS only receive their figures from the lenders and therefore only cover part of the market and are therefore weighted in the same way as the Halifax and Nationwide figures are - and they never, ever agree.
Games set and match to LR, even if they are 2 months out of date.
Extract From Guardian Money:
LAND REGISTRY
Who compiles it? The Land Registry is the government department responsible for registering and recording details of land and property ownership in England and Wales. It employs Calnea Analytics to actually compile the data.
What does it show? The average asking price of properties bought in the past month – these are the prices on completion and include cash purchases as well as those funded with a mortgage. It also reports annual and monthly price changes.
What area does it cover? England and Wales.
What time period does it cover? Calendar month.
What is it based on? The prices paid in residential sales in England and Wales completed during the month and reported to the Land Registry – about 35% are usually reported by the month end.
How long has it been going? Since 2005, although data going back to January 1995 has been added.
Is it seasonally adjusted? Yes.
What else is done to the raw data? Any property that hasn't been sold at least twice since 1995 is removed from the sample – Land Registry says it has slightly more than 6m identifiable matched pairs of sales – and the index is based on the repeat sales regression method. The average price as at April 2000 is taken as the baseline price, and growth measured in each period is applied to it to produce the current average price. Full details are here (pdf).
Why should I trust it? Land Registry says its index is "the most accurate independent house price index available. Using our data set of completed sales, it is the only index based on repeat sales." It is the only one based on all sales, mortgaged and otherwise, and on the final price achieved for the property.
Why should I be sceptical? Like some of the others it is seasonally adjusted. It doesn't reflect the prices paid for new-build properties or those that have remained in the same hands for a long period, which means fewer than the 35% of sales reported are actually used. The index is revised each month because of the time lag between completions and registrations, which means it is eventually very robust, but also means you are dealing with a figure which will change slightly.
OFFICE FOR NATIONAL STATISTICS
Who compiles it? Previously the communities and local government department, now the Office for National Statistics – the government's official data collectors.
What does it show? The average price on completion for a property in the UK, and annual and monthly changes. Data is broken down by region, type of property and type of buyer.
What area does it cover? The whole of the UK.
What time period does it cover? A full calendar month, but there is a lag – March's figures are published in May.
What is it based on? Data from a sample of completed property sales provided by mortgage lenders, representing about 65%-70% of homes bought with mortgages. During 2007, when there were on average about 85,000 loans a month for house purchase in the UK, approximately 50,000 records a month were supplied by about 60 lenders. In the six months to June 2011 there were an average of 37,000 loans a month for house purchase, and 26 lenders supplied information on about 21,600 sales.
How long has it been going? Since February 2002.
Is it seasonally adjusted? The index includes both seasonally adjusted figures and untouched figures at the national level.
What else is done to the raw data? It is "mix-adjusted" so it isn't skewed if a lot of flats in the south-east are sold one month, then a lot of four-bed homes in Scotland the next. Different characteristics of each property are given values/weights, and these feed into a model of an average home. The values are based on the transactions carried out during the previous three years. For example, the 2012 weights are based on transaction numbers from 2009-2010.
Why should I trust it? Because it is based on data from a large number of mortgage lenders and because, unlike most of the others, it isn't seasonally adjusted. The ONS says it is "one of the main house price indices used by central and local government to support decision making in the UK".
Why should I be sceptical? When the DCLG still managed the index it said it was "influenced by house price growth rates in the higher priced areas (which are currently in the south) where house prices – and therefore total expenditure on house buying – is highest. Similarly, regional rates of change in house prices determined by the DCLG Index are more influenced by the market for the higher priced properties (ie, the demand for detached houses)."
This may help - I am not saying it's right, but it offers informed opinion
http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2012/may/03/house-prices-different-indices
Can anyone actually explain the discrepancy?
Land Reg figures have to be spot on (if 60-90 days out of date).
So how do the ONS "calculate" their figures?
@ Richard Hair on 2012-12-19 09:26:22
EW on 2012-12-19 09:52:16
Clare Nash on 2012-12-19 10:00:13
I agree!
Land Registry - enough said!
Its like the secret of good comedy - timing.
All data is out of date - prices are determined at point of sale, not when figures are recorded months after sales agreed, exchange and even completion.
Data shows trends and is not necessarily a reflect of current conditions. A good agent will have a finger on the local pulse.
Likewise, averages are never indicative of the extremes they represent. Sellers want to know what their house is worth - not the average for the area, town or UK.
It has to be the Land Registry as their prices are facts. I cannot understand how any other data can be considered relevant or accurate. We regularly see the figures from Halifax, Nationwide and ONS all telling completely different stories so they cannot have any real credibility. The only problem with the LR figures is that they are always about 2 months out of date. Much better however to have the correct figures even if they take time to arrive. Have a look on the LR website for their house price figures, they are very useful and can be split down into small areas.
Oh dear. Did someone hit the 2 instead of the 1 when the numbers for prices was written? 231 or 133. not much difference!
Average property price or average price of property being sold. Not the same thing and not just houses if we are being picky. Levels of sales can easily sway the figures so average price is a totally different thing.
Perhaps you ought to check the samples for both - the Land Registry is for England & Wales, wheres the ONS data is the old Communities and Local Government index that includes Scotland as well.
You can't compare like for like because the samples are different.