House prices in the UK have fallen for the fifth consecutive month according to a report by Hometrack Ltd.

The five-month spell is the longest trend of house prices in decline for more than two years. The average cost of a home in England and Wales fell by 0.2 pr cent to ₤174,000.

The Hometrack report is based on a survey of 3,500 real estate agents and surveyors, calculating average values using judgments of achievable prices rather than sale prices alone. Values based on completed housing transactions rose 9.1 percent in 2007, the Department for Communities and Local Government said Feb. 11.

`It is too early to talk of a major turnaround in the fortunes for the housing market,'' said Richard Donnell, director of research at London based research company Hometrack.

Along with the trend in falling property prices, mortgage approvals have also seen a sharp drop.  U.K. mortgage approvals fell by almost a third in January from a year earlier, the British Bankers' Association said in a separate report. Banks granted 44,288 loans for house purchase, an annual drop of 31 percent.

The last time house prices fell for such a long streak was in a 14-month-long period of declines which ended in August 2005, Hometrack said