House prices have grown 0.8% year-on-year*
There are 5% more homes for sale than a year ago, so buyers have more choice*
Northern regions continue to outperform, with the North West recording yearly growth of 3.1%*
Rents on new lets have increased by 3.3% year-on-year^
Average rent on new lets has reached a record £1,387 per month^
The property market remains mixed as we move into autumn. There are more homes for sale than there were a year ago, which is good news if you're looking to buy. But alongside this borrowing has become more expensive, making the maths harder.
The good news from the Autumn Budget is that Stamp Duty (the tax you pay when you buy a home) hasn't changed, and there's no new capital gains tax on homes, so moving won't cost you any more than it did before. If you're a first-time buyer, there's extra help on the way through the new 'Your First Home' scheme, and we'll know more about how it works next spring.
Looking towards the lettings market, rents and demand keep on climbing as renters are sticking where they are rather than getting onto the property ladder. Which has a knock-on effect as fewer homes are coming back to market. Here's what it all means for you, whichever side of the market you're on.
House prices are still rising, just more gently than they were. The average UK home is now worth £273,000, up 0.8% over the year, which is a slight slowdown on the 0.9% recorded in summer.*
The bigger shift has been in mortgage rates, which now sit at 5.2%, up from 4% at the start of the year and the highest they've been for three years. That's cooled things down a bit, and the number of sales being agreed is 9% lower than this time last year.* At the same time, rents have reached a record £1,387 a month.^
There's still real demand out there, but buyers are being choosier than they were, and they're working to tighter budgets. With the number of homes for sale 5% higher than a year ago, yours has more competition for attention.* So, pricing sensibly from day one matters more than it has done for a while. Homes that start out too ambitiously tend to sit and then end up selling for less than they would have done with a realistic figure in the first place.
Where you are makes a genuine difference to how quickly things move. Around three-quarters of homes listed in Scotland between April and June found a buyer within three months, while in London only 30% of sellers managed the same. Sellers in the North East, the North West, Yorkshire and the Humber, the West Midlands and Wales are also among the most likely to find a buyer inside three months.*
It's also worth knowing that different types of home are performing differently. Semi-detached houses are up 1.7% over the year and terraced homes 1.4%, while flats and maisonettes have slipped back by 1.3%.*
Your local branch can talk you through what that means for your particular street, because national averages only tell you so much.
More choice is the real opportunity here. With stock up 5% on last year and sellers more open to a sensible conversation about price, you're in a stronger negotiating position than buyers were twelve months ago.*
The catch is affordability. At 5.2%, mortgage rates are adding roughly £150 a month to the average buyer's repayments compared with the start of the year, which works out at about £1,800 extra annually.* If you're a first-time buyer, that makes getting a mortgage in principle early on useful. It's a lender's estimate of what they'd be willing to lend you, based on your income and outgoings, and it tells you your real budget before you start looking rather than after.
There's more help on the way too, as the Autumn Budget announced a new 'Your First Home' scheme to support first-time buyers in England, find out more about the scheme here.
Affordability also varies a lot by region. Prices in London have fallen 1% over the year, with the South East down 0.7% and both the South West and the East of England down 0.3%. If you're buying in the south, that softening works in your favour. Further north the picture flips, with the North West up 3.1% and Liverpool leading the cities at 4.3%.*
When buying gets harder, more people remain in the rental market for a longer period, and that's feeding straight into rental demand.
The Autumn Budget did confirm that tax on rental income will rise again from April 2027, but there's no change to capital gains tax or Stamp Duty for landlords, and with tenant demand this strong, letting still makes good sense.
Agreed rents for new tenancies have hit an average of £1,387 a month across the UK, up 3.3% over the year and 0.4% on the previous month alone. Strip London out and the average is £1,176, up 3.1% annually.^
Growth isn't uniform across the country, so it's worth knowing your own area. The South West is leading at 5.4% annual growth with average rents of £1,274, followed by Scotland at 4.9%. The East Midlands is quietly solid at 2.1%, while the North West has been steadier at 2.9% with rents averaging £1,115. Wales is the one outlier, with rents down 0.4% over the year.^
On affordability, tenants across the UK are spending 32.0% of their income on rent,^ which suggests there's limited headroom for pushing rents much harder in most areas. For most landlords, keeping a good tenant in a well-maintained home is worth more over time than chasing the top of the market. If you're thinking about expanding, softer prices in the south and a wider choice of stock make this a reasonable moment to look.
Prices are expected to edge up by around 0.5% by the end of the year, with roughly 1.1 million homes still forecast to sell across 2026.* So, while higher borrowing costs have taken some heat out of things, this is a market that's still moving, just at a steadier pace.
Whatever you're planning, your local branch knows your area far better than any national average does, so do get in touch and we'll talk it through properly.
Correct at time of publishing - 15/10/2026
Sources:
*Zoopla House Price Index, September 2026 | ^HomeLet Rental Index, September 2026
MKT/UKON/230926