As a nation, we obsess. We obsess about the weather, taxes, the state of the roads, death and the cost of milk. I could go on. And there’s one other thing uppermost in our minds: house prices.
I’ve lived in the same place for six years but I still can’t pass an estate agent without glancing in the window. I keep a close eye on house prices in my local area – are they, up, down, static – and I regularly calculate the amount of equity in my property. Yet I have no intention of moving.
I’m not alone in all this, which goes some way to explain why house price indices are followed so closely. It’s not just about first-time buyers, upsizers, downsizers or any of the other categories of home-movers; we all care about the cost of what will probably be our biggest ever financial outlay.
And so to today’s house price index from Halifax.
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