Increases in house prices and sales volumes revealed in report

The average cost of a home in Scotland rose by 4% last year, new figures show.

Statistics released by Registers of Scotland (RoS) reveal the typical cost of a residential property in 2017 was £172,779.

This was up more than £6,000, or 4%, on the £166,062 recorded for the previous year.

“Average prices have been following a generally upward trend since 2012,” the report notes.

The RoS survey for 2017 also reveals a 4.2% increase in the volume of Scottish property sales, compared to 2016, with 103,617 total sales.

Sales volumes have also been on an upward trajectory since 2011, increasing every year since then.

A regional breakdown of the figures shows that East Renfrewshire and Edinburgh continued to have the highest average house prices last year at £252,870 and £249,651, respectively.

The largest annual changes were in South Lanarkshire and Glasgow, with increases of 8.6% and 7.8%, respectively.

East Lothian and the Western Isles experienced the largest jump in sales volumes between 2016 and 2017, both posting increases of more than 16%.

Edinburgh and Glasgow had the highest total number of sales, more than 12,000 each, in 2017.

Just three local authorities reported decreases in the number of sales going through last year – Clackmannanshire, Midlothian and Dundee.

Overall, the value of the Scottish property market increased by 8.5% in a year, to £17.9 billion, the study reveals.