House prices in England and Wales rose for the sixth month in a row in November, the Land Registry says.

Prices rose another 0.9% last month, which means that prices were just 0.3% lower than a year ago.

The average home in England and Wales now costs £161,554 – £8,800 higher than at its recent low point in April.

Prices in London have been rising the fastest and are now 3.5% higher than year ago, although prices in Yorkshire and the Humber still 4.7% lower.

The Land Registry said the volume of sales had picked up, but was still relatively low:

“In the months June 2009 to September 2009, transaction volumes averaged 55,520 transactions per month,” it said.

“This is an increase from the same period last year, when sales volumes averaged 50,187.”

Paying off debt

Other figures, from the Bank of England, show that home owners have continued to reduce their mortgage debts.

In the third quarter of 2009, peoples’ equity in their homes rose by another £4.9bn, the Bank said.

It was the sixth quarter in a row in which homeowners increased their stakes in their properties, and means that in the 18 months to the end of September, £34bn was knocked off the nation’s collective mortgage debt.

With house prices now picking up again and lenders relaxing their lending criteria slightly, the amount of equity injected into property in the third quarter was the smallest since the spring of 2008 when the process started.

Between the middle of 1998 and early 2008, homeowners had borrowed £325bn against the inflated value of their homes, topping up their mortgages and spending their money on things other than their homes.

However, the sudden house price crash, triggered by the recession and the banking crisis, brought this sort of borrowing to a halt.

The process was then reversed, with home owners taking advantage of record low interest rates to repay chunks of their mortgages, or being forced by cautious lenders to put down higher deposits when buying a new home. (Via Original Source)