Welsh house prices drop £2,000 over last 12 months

House prices in Wales have fallen after three months of small rises, with average prices down £597 in December

Monthly sales in 2012 averaged 2,523 compared with 2,565 in 2011. Comparing sales during the last three months of 2012 with the same period in 2011, there was a 1 per cent increase in the number of semi-detached properties sold, no change in sales of detached properties and a 4 per cent drop in the sales of both terraced properties and flats.

“December figures show the Welsh housing market has regressed back to the low point it was at last September," said Oliver Blake, Managing Director of Reeds Rains estate agents which has branches in Wales. "House prices are lower than they were two years ago and are £393 below the average house price in 2008, and that doesn’t even taken inflation into account. The combination of slow economic growth, high rents and the rising cost of living are knocking confidence and putting the brakes on recovery."

The unitary authority area with the highest percentage increase in sales in the last three months of 2012 compared to the same period in 2011 is Ceredigion, up 27 per cent, followed by the Isle of Anglesey (25%). The unitary authority areas in the south of the Principality - Carmarthenshire, Neath Port Talbot, Bridgend, Rhondda and Cardiff - all saw a decline in the number of properties sold. Cardiff transactions were down 13 per cent on the previous year, with sales of semi-detached properties the biggest fallers, down 21 per cent.