City house price growth is now being led by regional cities, with Manchester at the top, and not by the old favourite London, Hometrack’s city house price index has revealed.
Out of the country’s top 20 cities for annual house price growth, London has now dropped to number 10 with a growth of 5.6%, a significant decrease from 12.8% twelve months ago.
Other cities, apart from Manchester which saw a strong growth of 8.8% include Portsmouth up 8.1% year on year, Bristol up 8%, Glasgow up 7.7%, Birmingham up 7.4%, Leicester up 7.2%, Liverpool up 6.8% and Bournemouth up 6.2%. Aberdeen is the only city to see prices fall with a decline of 5.9% year on year.
The report points out that one of the main factors impacting the growth rate of cities in England’s south s pressure through affordability.
And whilst housing turnover has been pretty flat for the last three years in high value, low affordability cities such as London, Bristol, Oxford and Cambridge, growth in the North’s bigger cities like Manchester, Birmingham and Liverpool is almost unstoppable.
Sales volumes in Liverpool and Manchester have increased by over 40% over the last three years, and have increased by about 10% in 2016 alone.
Overall, the report suggests a slower 2017 when it comes to house price growth with the biggest achievements still happening in the country’s regional cities, such as Birmingham and Newcastle.
The Hometrack report adds:
“We expect sales volumes to fall by around 5% in the highest value cities over 2017, as the market and pricing levels start to adjust to price sensitive and affordability constrained demand. We expect slower growth in volumes in regional cities where there remains continued upside for market activity and house prices on more attractive affordability.”
