House prices up 0.2% in February, says Nationwide

House prices up 0.2% in February, says Nationwide.

UK house prices rose by 0.2% in February compared with the previous month, but were the same as a year ago, the Nationwide has said.

The building society said that the average UK home cost £162,638.

The figures, based on its own mortgage data, signalled the lack of movement in prices in the last two years, it said.

But there were "tentative signs" of a pick-up in activity in recent months owing to the relative strength of the jobs market.

"While the economic backdrop remains challenging, there are reasons for cautious optimism that activity will gather momentum in the months ahead," said Robert Gardner, Nationwide's chief economist.

"In particular, employment is rising at the fastest pace since the late 1990s which, if maintained, should help support demand for homes.

"However, progress is likely to be gradual, as stubbornly high inflation will continue to exert pressure on household budgets."

Buyer confidence was "fragile", he added, even though mortgage rates had become cheaper as a result of the Funding for Lending scheme (FLS).

FLS is a scheme run by the Bank of England which, since last August, has been offering cheap funds to banks and building societies, on condition they then lend the money to personal and business customers.

However, figures from the Council of Mortgage Lenders have suggested a sluggish start to the year in terms of mortgage activity, which could feed through to house prices later.

This was confirmed by figures from the Bank of England, also published on Friday, which showed that £147m was added in January to the total amount borrowed in mortgages. The total outstanding mortgage debt stands at £1.2 trillion.

This was considerably less than the £877m added in December, and lower than the average seen in the previous six months of £500m.

The number of mortgage approvals for house purchases stood at 54,719 in January, down on the 55,632 seen in December, but slightly higher than the average of the previous six months.

Retailing.

UK house prices rose by 0.2% in February compared with the previous month, but were the same as a year ago, the Nationwide has said. The building society said that the average UK home cost £162,638.

Business vocabulary.

1. Backup – дублирование.
2. Direct insurer – прямой страховщик.
3. Immiserizing growth – разоряющий рост.
4. Law of one price – закон единой цены.
5. Marginal output rule – правило предельного выпуска.
6. Price floor – нижний предел цены.
7. Procurement – закупки.
8. Random walk – случайные колебания.
9. Scarcity – редкость.
10. Semi-processed product – полуфабрикат.
11. Temporary layoffs – временные увольнения.
12. Utility – полезность.
13. Vault cash – деньги в хранилище.
14. Total revenue – общая выручка.
15. Income statement – отчёт о доходе.
16. Appreciation – удорожание.
17. Perfect competition – совершенная конкуренция.
18. Tax evasion – уклонение от налогов.
19. Wage rate – ставка заработной платы.
20. Net replacement rate – чистая норма возмещения.
21. Diseconomies of scales – ущерб от масштаба.
22. Grants – дотации.
23. Free trade area – зона свободной торговли.
24. Cash flow – движение наличности, ликвидности.
25. Underwriter – гарант (поручитель)
26. Dual pricing – двойственное ценообразование.
27. Coordination failure – нехватка (провал) согласования.
28. Buffer stock – резервный запас.
29. Luxury – лучший, предмет роскоши.
30. Hazard – ущерб.
31. Poverty – бедность.
32. Rate of return – норма отдачи.
33. Repurchase agreement – соглашение о выкупе.
34. Risk averse behavior – поведение избегания риска.
35. Supply access – доступ к сырью и материалам.
36. Tradeoff – выбор (обмен)
37. Sacrifice ratio – норма потерь.
38. Production smoothing – сглаживание производства.
39. Loanable funds – заёмные средства.
40. Logrolling – покупка голосов

Analysis

1. It is difficult not to agree that the problem of housing prices there are active in Russia. In my opinion, at the moment the dominant feature of this was the Olympic Games in Sochi in 2014.

2. In 2006, the price of real estate has grown at an incredible pace, in 2009 - fell. In 2012, we observed an increase in household income, improving the availability of mortgage loans, a significant rate of growth of the money supply despite the fact that the increase in housing supply is negligible.

3. One example of our capital Moscow. Moscow was second among the 10 largest cities in the world for growth in housing prices.

4. I must say that all the forecasts of real estate prices are probabilistic in nature. No one will guarantee that the market will develop only in a particular vector.