U.K. housing market sentiment falls again in November

The housing market sentiment in U.K. eased further in November. On a year-on-year basis, the Rightmove house price index dropped 0.2 percent, the first annual drop since 2011. London saw the main weakness, where asking prices in the centre of the capital fell almost 7 percent year-on-year, while Greater London saw a drop of 2.4 percent. These results were in line with the latest insights from the RICS Residential Markets survey, which implied that of home prices above GBP 1 million, almost three quarters of properties were sold below their asking prices.

While the message from official ONS/Land Registry House Price Index has stayed quite benign, the latest months might bring more negative news, especially for the most expensive properties on the market. The softness possibly shows to some extent market nervousness about Brexit, while stretched affordability ratios are also a significant factor.

“However, it is worth noting that fundamentals appear broadly unchanged - consumer sentiment has moved sideways, albeit at a subdued level, and real wage growth is inching very gradually higher. Against this backdrop, we expect UK house price growth to remain in positive territory in the near future, unless, of course, a disorderly Brexit materialises”, said Daiwa Capital Market Research in a report.

At 18:00 GMT the FxWirePro's Hourly Strength Index of British Pound was slightly bearish at -64.4506, while the FxWirePro's Hourly Strength Index of US Dollar was highly bearish at -110.556. For more details on FxWirePro's Currency Strength Index, visit http://www.fxwirepro.com/currencyindex