Housing experts say downturn threatens after £16,000 rise in prices over year
House prices increased strongly by £16,000 on average over the year to May - but experts warned the market is now at serious risk of a downturn.
Across the UK, the typical property value was £211,000 in May, marking an 8.1% increase compared with a year earlier, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.
The average UK house price was £16,000 higher than in May 2015 and £2,400 higher than a month earlier, the ONS said.
The annual rate of house price growth was unchanged compared with April - "continuing the strong growth seen since the end of 2013," the report said.
The official figures show the state of the housing market before the EU referendum vote. Some other housing market reports, which have included data collected following the vote, have suggested the market is cooling.
Last week, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics) said the supply of homes coming on the market is plummeting at the sharpest rate on records going back to 1998.
It said interest from potential buyers was also fading at the fastest rate since 2008, while house price falls are increasingly taking a grip in London.
The ONS figures show that in May, the typical house price in England was £227,000, while in Wales it was £143,000, in Scotland it stood at £141,000 and in Northern Ireland it was £118,000.
The local authority showing the largest annual growth in the year to May 2016 was Slough, where prices increased by 23.3% to stand at £287,000.
The lowest annual growth was recorded in the City of London, where prices fell by 9.2% to stand at £692,000 on average.
Previous housing market reports have suggested that property prices in Slough have been boosted by the Crossrail railway development as well as the number of technology-related jobs available there.
The most expensive borough to live in is Kensington and Chelsea, where the cost of an average house was £1.27 million in May. Burnley is the cheapest place to buy a home, with the average property costing £69,000.
London continued to be the region with the highest average house price at £472,000, followed by the South East and the East of England, where prices stood at £306,000 and £265,000 respectively.
The North East was the English region with the lowest average house price, at £124,000, with property values there having lifted by 3.2% over the year to May.
The ONS said that in London, house prices surged by 13.6% in the year to May 2016. The South East and the East of England also had particularly strong annual price growth, at 12.9% and 12.8% respectively.
Howard Archer, chief UK and European economist at IHS Global Insight, said: "The ONS house price data are for May so were pre-Brexit vote. It also needs to be borne in mind that the ONS's measure of house price inflation lags many of the other measures as it is based on mortgage completions.
"Pretty solid fundamentals for house buyers - high employment, decent purchasing power and very low mortgage rates - remained a source of support for the housing market through to May while a shortage of properties has also supported house prices."
Mr Archer said he suspected that house prices could fall back by 5% during the second half of 2016.
Mr Archer continued: "Housing market activity and prices look to be at very serious risk of an extended, marked downturn following the UK's vote to leave the EU. This is likely to weigh down markedly on economic activity and consumer confidence, which is not good news for the housing market."
Andrew Bridges, managing director of London estate agent Stirling Ackroyd, said it is likely that house prices have already fallen to some extent in some parts of the country since the figures for May.
But he continued: "Beyond a couple of months' volatility, the real drivers of UK property values have hardly changed. Across the country there are still too few homes to match demand."
