Rightmove Says U.K. House Price Data Meaningless in Lockdown

(Bloomberg) -- The coronavirus lockdown has made it impossible to produce meaningful statistics on U.K. house prices, Rightmove Plc said.

The market has seen a sharp reversal, going from the best start to a year since 2016 to new sales being almost impossible, the property website said Monday.

Visits to the site fell by about 40% when the curbs were announced and are now recovering slowly. What little data was collected for April showed a slight decline in the average asking price from the previous month.

The government should encourage banks to continue lending as usual and limit forced sales until employment recovers, Rightmove said. That should help activity pick up quickly when the virus passes.

“We need to avoid a repeat of the post-credit-crunch mortgage famine,” said director Miles Shipside.

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