The average price of a house in Scotland has risen to almost £200,000, according to the latest official data.
Registers of Scotland figures have revealed that house prices have risen by 6.7 per cent in the past 12 months, meaning an average residential property is now worth £194,100.
The price has almost doubled in the past two decades, and is up by 25% when compared with the pre-financial crash average price of £154,813 in 2007-08, according to the Registers of Scotland’s Property Market Report, 2020-21.
However, rising prices may be linked to falling sales, with the number of homes changing hands at its lowest vaolume for the past three financial years.
During 2020-21, the volume of residential property sales fell by 6.5 per cent from 102,053 sales 2019-20 to 95,428 sales in 2020-21 while the introduction of COVID-19 measures resulted in a substantial drop in sales being submitted to Registers of Scotland for registration in the first quarter of 2020-21, followed by some higher-than-average increases in the latter quarters of the year as lockdown measures were relaxed.
READ MORE: House prices in Scotland change in 2020
The sales volume remains 36 per cent below the pre-financial crisis level peak of 149,944 sales in 2006-07.
The value of residential property sales in the financial year 2020-21 was £18.5 billion, a decrease of 0.2 per cent when compared with 2019-20.
Covid restrictions had an impact on sales
This marked the first year there was a decrease when compared with the previous year since 2011-12.
The residential sales market value increased every year from 2012-13 to 2019-20, but remains 19 per cent below the pre-financial crisis level peak in 2007-08 (£22.9 billion).
The report also looks at the non-residential market. The total market value of non-residential sales in 2020-21 was £2.8 billion. Commercial sales accounted for 71 per cent of this total, with the remainder from sales of forestry, agriculture and land.
The non-residential market was also impacted by COVID-19 measures. In particular, there was an adverse impact on the market value of the commercial sales market, with market values in 2020-21 being lower in every month than the market values in 2019-20, except for March 2020-21.
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Commenting on the release, Accountable Officer, Janet Egdell said: “The combined market value of the residential and non-residential markets in 2020-21 was £21.3 billion, 4.9 per cent lower than the previous year 2019-20.
"The combined market value remains 30 per cent lower than the peak of the market in 2007-08 (£30.4 billion), but 24 percent higher than 2003-04 (17.2 billion).”
Alan Cumming, national Estate Agency Director, Aberdein Considine, added: “It’s no surprise that prices have risen significantly compared to 2019/20 with a substantial number of buyers and a shortage of property coming to the market.
"From the second half of 2020 family homes in particular have been selling like hotcakes and the market is hungry for new properties making this a great time to consider selling your home”
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