House prices in the North East rise by 0.3 per cent in February

New data has revealed that house prices are continuing to edge up, as values of North East properties rose by 0.3 per cent in February.
According to aol.co.uk, the data from Hometrack reveals that on average, UK properties are now selling for more. In January, the average home achieved 95.3 per cent of its asking price. This crept up to 95.8 per cent last month.
Demand for homes is on the up, rising by 17.1 per cent in February, which is likely why prices continue to increase. However, the supply of homes grew too, by an impressive 11.2 per cent - the most dramatic growth seen in seven years.
Richard Donnell, director of research at Hometrack, notes that there is still an imbalance between housing supply and demand.
"The housing recovery continues to spread across the country, building on the momentum that started a year ago," he said. "The latest survey shows that house prices increased across 51 per cent of the country in February, the greatest coverage of house price growth for almost a decade."
Demand has largely been driven by government schemes such as Help to Buy, but the low mortgage rates have been partly responsible too, reports propertywire.com.