UK housing market weakness continues

Property outlook: A pedestrian crosses Tower Bridge in view of skyscrapers on the skyline of London. Rents are expected to rise 4% across Britain in the coming 12 months due to an imbalance in demand and supply. — Bloomberg

LONDON: Britain’s housing market continued to feel the pinch of higher borrowing costs in March, but property surveyors expect some improvement over the year ahead as they think interest rates are now near their peak, a survey shows.

The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) said its house price net balance – which measures the difference between the percentage of surveyors seeing rises and falls in house prices – fell to minus 43 last month, up from minus 47 in February, and slightly above the minus 48 forecast in a Reuters poll of economists.