Flexibility

It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that with house price indices, like so many things, there are lies, damn lies and statistics. With so much competing information out there it is normally possible to prove any point you want to make about property. And a look back in time (you can find past news stories on sites like www.thisismoney.co.uk/houseprices) shows that many of the big names’ predictions for previous years have been woefully wrong. House price indices are great fun and make great news stories. But as ever the only accurate price for any property is the one a buyer is willing to pay. And no national survey can tell you in advance what that is likely to be.

UK Equity

Housing equity in the UK was £787bn in 1996 and in 2006 this had risen to £2.7trillion an increase of 244%. Research also shows that property ownership now accounts for 43% of UK households net wealth compared to ten years ago when it was 28%.