After a positive start to the property market for 2025 we have now seen a downturn in asking prices for the second half of the year. After a small fall in the national house price during June the market took a surprising fall of 1.2% during July, resulting in a real time fall of £4531 and a lower national house price that stands at £373,709. This price reflects a fall in advertised prices from sellers on Rightmove, sellers are having to reduce the advertised price of their property and be more competitive as their is a decade high amount of homes available for sale. This may result in a domino effect in the forthcoming months of sellers having to repeatedly reduce the price of their home in competition with others who are doing the same. The recent fall in the national house price has also prompted Rightmove to lower their end of year forecast from previously predicting that house prices will rise by 4% to now 2%. 

Mortgage rates fell at the beginning of the year but have now plateaued with the lowest two year fixed rate at 3.68%. It has however recently become a concern that the Bank of England base rate may not fall as much as was expected. On 19th June the base rate remained at 4.25% for the second consecutive month. Currently the average five year fixed mortgage stands at 5.01% which is still higher than the average mortgage rate of a couple of years ago. If mortgage rates continue to fall it will make buying a house more accessible for many, in theory this should get the property market moving faster.

Certain costs for homeowners may still hold the market back, inflation at the shops and higher energy bills have caused a cost of living crisis. During 2025 Inflation has consistently been on the rise and it was reported to be 4.1% in June which is the highest it’s been this year. This is however significantly lower than the peak of 9.6% that was seen in 2022 but prices are still rising but just not as fast. Consumer spending took a sharp fall of 1.1% from May to June and is a further sign that house buyers may be feeling the pressure of increased inflation and in turn may have less money to spend and affordability for buying a property.

What Are the Current House Price Figures?

In the UK there are various different sources that analyse the market and produce average house price figures with differing results so here’s a look at what each index has reported:

Halifax

The Halifax House Price Index reported in July and represents figures for June, shows a negligible change in the monthly house price which is represented as a 0% change. In real terms it was a change from May’s average price of £296,782 to June’s price of £296,665. Annual growth is also slightly down from 2.6% in May to now 2.5% since the same time last year. Even though house price have remained stagnant there is a good rate of activity with mortgage approval and transactions on the up. The Halifax national house price can seen in the chart below:

Halifax National House Price Chart June

Nationwide

The Nationwide House Price index for July shows a 0.6% house price increase since June. It is also positive to see that the annual house price has increased from 2.1% to 2.4%. It is reported that properties are becoming relatively more affordable with the average price being 5.75 times the average income whereas it was 6.6 times back in 2022. The report for July shows that the national house price ended up at £272,664.

Nationwide House Price Index July 2025

Zoopla

Similar to Rightmove, Zoopla record advertised “For Sale” prices so they are always more optimistic than Land Registry results and prices that are reported by mortgage lenders. Zoopla are reporting that house prices inflation has slowed at 1.3% higher than the previous year, this figure is down from 1.9% in December so in theory house price growth has slowed significantly in 2025. Similar to Rightmove, Zoopla have downgraded their growth forecast by half from 2% to 1%.  According to Zoopla the average house price currently stands at £268,400.

Zoopla House Price Chart July 2025

Rightmove

House Prices on Rightmove are based on asking prices and the UK average now stands at £373,709. July’s figures show a significant decrease of £4531which is 1.3% lower than the previous month. Most significantly Rightmove have lowered their growth forecast for 2025 from 4% to 2%. The full report for July can be seen here.

Office of National Statistics

The Office of National Statistics now reports data in a report that is called Private Rent and House Prices. The data for July shows that over the past year the national house price has increased 3.9% for figures recorded up to May and stands at £269,000. These figures are delayed by a couple of months as they are based on completed prices. 

Should You Buy a House in 2025 or Wait?

2025 started of positively with many transactions and increased house prices. This was largely due to people trying to complete before the April 1st Stamp Duty hikes. Now that’s out the way house prices have started to fall. As we enter the second half of the year analysts have realised a more pessimistic view of how the year will end up and have lowered their growth forecasts.

There is currently the most available stock that we have seen in a decade and buyers have plenty of choice. With there being far more properties for sale than available buyers purchasers could take advantage of it being a buyers market.

There is a risk that house prices could fall further and maybe even take a tumble with a domino effect of sellers having to reduce their asking price multiple times. With this in mind house prices have reduced since their all time highs so as a buyer you will not be buying at the top of the market. It could be a good opportunity to a grab a a bargain from a seller who may have been tying to sell their home for quite a while, particularly for properties at the higher end of the market as we have seen that the higher priced properties have been taking far longer to sell. House buyers will likely see a lot of asking prices that have been recently reduced and buyers could find themselves in a good position to further ask for a reduction the sale price.

Here are some of the the predictions of how far house prices could rise or fall during 2025: