Home costs outstrip wages

A study of property trends over the last half-century found average house prices after allowing for inflation increased 273 per cent, equating to an annual rate of 2.7 per cent and outstripping the average real earnings growth rate of two per cent.

Martin Ellis, housing economist at Halifax said the disparity between wage growth and house price increases could partly be explained by cultural changes.

During the last half-century there has been a shift from one income to two-wage households as more and more women were able to have careers.

But this is balanced by a "significant" rise in single person households, from less than one in five in England in 1971 to one in three by last year.