UK house price inflation continued to slow earlier this year, while rental growth hit record levels, official figures have revealed.
The average price of a home increased 6.3% in the year to January 2023, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) revealed, down from 9.3% in December.
The average UK house costs roughly £290,000 in January, which is £17,000 higher than a year earlier.
Geographically, average house prices increased 6.9% in England to £310,000, 5.8% higher to £217,000 in Wales, up 1% to £185,000 in Scotland and up 10.2% to £175,000 in Northern Ireland.
Aimee North, the ONS's head of housing market indices, said: "Annual house price inflation, measured using final transaction prices, slowed again in January, consistent across all nations and regions."
ONS also published a report on housing affordability and put out data on UK rental prices for February.
The first showed full-time employees in England could typically expect to spend around 8.3 times their annual earnings buying a home, down from 9.1 times in 2021.
Rents meanwhile continued to climb, with the strongest growth since records began in 2016.
Private rental prices paid by tenants in the UK rose by 4.7% over the 12 months, up from 4.4%. Annual private rental prices increased by 4.5% in England, 4.2% in Wales and 4.9% in Scotland.
A 4.6% surge in London’s rents resulted in the highest annual percentage increase in over a decade.