RICS House Price Balance

It is the headline of the RICS UK Residential Market Survey, a monthly poll of chartered surveyors in sales and lettings. Chartered surveyors are qualified property valuers; the headline covers England and Wales across 10 regions, excluding Scotland and Northern Ireland. It is the longest monthly survey of house prices, tracking breadth (how widespread rises or falls are), not actual price changes or size. Positive means rises are more widespread than falls, negative the reverse, and the Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee cites it.

It comes out monthly, about 11 days after the reference month ends, just after midnight UK time. The Next embargo date line in each release sets the next two dates, and RICS publishes no exact collection dates. The headline covers prices over the previous 3 months; demand, supply and sales cover the prior month and expectations look 3 and 12 months ahead. Each release also reports demand, supply, sales, expectations, lettings and regions; full history is paid and past values can be restated.

The headline has one input; the rest are context series published beside it.

• Price reports over the previous 3 months: the only input, showing how widely rises or falls spread across surveyors.
• New buyer enquiries: demand over the prior month.
• New vendor instructions: fresh supply over the prior month.
• Agreed sales: completed transactions over the prior month.
• Price and sales expectations, 3 months and 12 months ahead: views on where prices and deals go next.
• Lettings demand, supply and rent expectations: tenant demand, landlord supply and expected rent growth.

In one past release the price balance held at +69% against +71% in the prior release. Buyer enquiries read +9% for a fourth straight gain. Vendor instructions read -14% for a ninth straight fall while agreed sales dipped to -13% from -9% on thin stock. 12-month price expectations hit +67% with Scotland at +88% and South West England at +84%. Rent expectations hit +57% with 27% more noting falling landlord instructions, while low supply lifted prices but blocked sales.

1. Answers: Each surveyor reports whether average prices in their area went down, stayed the same, or went up over the previous 3 months.
2. Shares: Count the share reporting a rise (R) and the share reporting a fall (F); steady answers sit only in the total.
3. Net balance: Subtract fall share from rise share in percentage points: NB = 100 x (N_rise - N_fall)/N_total, range -100 to +100. If 30% reported a rise and 5% a fall, the balance is 30 - 5 = +25%.
4. Regional weighting (combining regions by size): Aggregate responses to an England and Wales headline using regional weights; Scotland and Northern Ireland answers are excluded.
5. Seasonal adjustment using X-12 (removing normal seasonal swings): Adjust the series with the X-12 method so regular seasonal patterns do not distort the signal.