The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors' measure of new buyer enquiries rose to a net balance of -18, the least negative figure since -14 in May 2022 and up from -34 in April.RICS' house price balance, which measures the difference between the percentage of surveyors seeing rises and falls in house prices, increased to -30 last month from -39 in April. A Reuters poll of analysts had pointed to a reading of -38.
However, analysts are forecasting another slowdown for the housing market with markets largely expecting the BoE's Bank Rate to peak at 5.5% later this year, up from 4.5% now. "It seems storm clouds are gathered, with the UK's stubbornly high inflation likely undermining the recent improvement in activity," Tarrant Parsons, senior economist at RICS, said.
Britain's housing market staged a recovery earlier this year after former prime minister Liz Truss's "mini-budget" caused turmoil in financial markets in September and sent the cost of fixed mortgage rates sharply higher to above 6%.Britain's biggest mortgage lender, Halifax, on Wednesday said house prices