UK house prices showed a surprise bounce in March, as the Nationwide house price index on Thursday registered its first rise since October 2007.

The index rose by 0.9 per cent in March, bringing the year-on-year decline to 15.7 per cent from the 17.6 per cent annual drop in February, but Fionnuala Earley, Nationwide’s chief economist, warned against reading too much into the latest data.