us home prices rise for a second quarter while uk mortgage see 100 percent increase
News Posted On: 25 November 2009
Positive housing numbers just keep coming in on both sides of the Atlantic, though the surge up from the troughs of last Christmas should now by rights be due for a festive seasonal slowdown.
Indeed the latest figures from the S&P composite index of home prices in 20 metropolitan areas hints at this, as the rise came in lower than the 0.8 percent forecast in a recent poll. Data released on Tuesday showed a rise of just 0.3 percent in September, well below the 1.2 percent recorded in the previous month.
While the 20-city index still had an annual decline of 9.4 percent – a lagging indicator that is itself improving dramatically - quarterly figures were up by a presentable 3.1 percent, the same value as in the previous quarter.
Year on year these statistics show an 8.9 percent annual drop - a big improvement on the 14.7 percent and 19 percent slumps measured in the second and first quarters of 2009 respectively.
The smaller 10-city S&P index rose 0.4 percent in September following a 1.3 percent August gain, while the annual drop here was 8.5 percent.
'We have seen broad improvement in home prices for most of the past six months,' said David M. Blitzer, chairman of the Index Committee at S&P in a statement. 'However, the gains in the most recent month are more modest than during the seasonally strong summer months.
Meanwhile in the UK the number of home loans approved by British banks in October was almost double that of a year ago, a survey by the British Bankers' Association (BBA) showed on Tuesday.
According to the BBA 42,238 mortgage applications were approved in October. While that was only slightly higher than the 42,073 loans in the previous month, it was a full 97.7% higher than last year when the credit crunch was biting hardest into the economy.
The value of net mortgage lending rose by 3.1 billion pounds in October, the same as it did in September.
Today's figures are in line with other surveys in the UK and US showing record low interest rates have helped stabilise housing markets on both sides of the Atlantic after the sharp price declines of last year.
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