UK annual house price growth in October was at its lowest level since May 2013, according to the latest Nationwide house price index, which revealed that annual house price growth slowed to 1.6% in October, down from the 2% reported in September.

The average house price in October was £214,534, a slight fall on the £214,922 recorded a month earlier. Commenting on the slowdown to 1.6%, Robert Gardner, chief economist at Nationwide Building Society, said: “As a result, annual house price growth moved below the narrow range of [around] 2-3% prevailing over the previous 12 months.

“However, this was broadly in line with our expectations, as the squeeze on household budgets and the uncertain economic outlook is likely to have dampened demand, even though borrowing costs remain low by historic standards and unemployment is at 40-year lows.

“We continue to expect house prices to rise by around 1% over the course of 2018. “Looking further ahead, much will depend on how broader economic conditions evolve.”

Jonathan Hopper, managing director at Garrington Property Finders, said of the HPI: “The property market may have dodged another stamp duty bullet in (the) Budget, but in many areas it remains caught in the crosshairs of weak confidence and stagnating prices. The South East’s slowdown is starting to spread to a few other regions, but the lion’s share of the blame for the increasingly glacial pace of national price growth lies with the falls seen in London.”