A recent Reuters report citing HBOS figures indicates that April’s housing prices took their worse fall since 1993. Reporters Matt Falloon and Sumeet Desai further reported that bad debt befell more than 25,000 during the first three months of the year.

"This is a dark cloud that is getting ever darker for the economy," Alan Clarke, an economist at BNP Paribas, told Reuters.
The mortgage lending giant released the data just subsequent to reports from Bank of England that suggested housing prices could drop by a third, Reuters reiterated. Adding to the disturbing nature of the report, an apparent increase in the number of companies closing down is accelerating fears in the UK that the country’s own economy won’t survive what may be an impending recession in the US.

Prices are 3.7 per cent lower than April 2007, with HBOS further reporting that prices fell 1.3 percent on the month to 189,027 pounds on average in April this year. Prices have declined steadily each month in 2008. Industry analysts have thus confirmed that this has been the greatest yearly decline in 15 years.