Key Statistics: 20th November 2012

Construction

• More good news for residential property came last week, RICS reported that buyer demand hit a three year high in October; the news strengthens our position that the private residential sector is set to perform well in 2013. Other news from the latest RICS survey reported that the rate of homes coming onto the market increased to the highest since April 2011.
• House prices as measure by the Office of National Statistics increased by 1.7% in September compared to September 2011, the ONS reported that prices in London continue to increase whereas prices in Northern Ireland are still falling.

UK Economy

• The Bank of England revised down its projection for UK economic activity last week in its quarterly Inflation Report. Mervyn King said that output will remain below the level seen in 2008 until 2014 stating, “We face the rather unappealing combination of a subdued recovery, with inflation remaining above target for a while.” 
• Inflation as measured by the Consumer Prices Index picked up in October to 2.7% up from 2.2% in September, university tuition fees were the biggest contributor to the rise in the rate of price increase.
• Unemployment for the period from July to September fell to 7.8% of the economically active population, down 0.2 percentage points from the previous April to June period. The employment rate also increased by 0.2 percentage points in the same period to 71.2%.
• Retail sales values in October increased by 1.6% compared to October 2011 however sales values were down compared to September by 0.4%.