UK house prices unexpectedly fall in July

LONDON: British house prices unexpectedly dropped for a second month in a row in July, pushing the annual growth rate to its lowest since March, figures from mortgage lender Halifax showed on Wednesday.

Halifax said house prices fell 0.2% on the month, compared with economists' forecasts in a Reuters poll for a 0.3% rise, while the annual growth rate dropped to 4.1% from 5.7%.

Halifax's annual growth rates remain elevated compared with other measures of British house prices -- which point to a broadly flat picture -- and Halifax said its annual figures were boosted by weak prices a year earlier.