By Toby Luckhurst

LONDON--U.K. house prices rose strongly in June, reversing three consecutive months of declines.

Prices were up by a monthly 1.1% in June, Nationwide Building Society's data showed, improving from May's 0.2% decline and breaking the longest run of monthly declines since 2009. Compared with June last year, house prices grew by 3.1% --accelerating from a 2.1% annual rise in May and 2.6% in April.

The price rises were above expectations, with economist forecasting only modest gains.

Nationwide's Chief Economist Robert Gardner said after two weaker months, annual growth "has returned to the 3-6% range that had been prevailing since early 2015." However, Mr. Gardner said there was a shift in regional house price trends, with the gap between the strongest performing region, East Anglia, and the weakest, the North, narrowing to its smallest on record.

London's house price growth slowed to 1.2% on an annual basis--the second slowest of the U.K.'s 13 regions and the weakest growth rate for the capital since 2012..

Whether house prices hold up as Britain disentangles itself from the European Union matters to the overall health of the economy. Over the past three decades, U.K. households have cut spending every time that house prices have fallen.

Write to Toby Luckhurst at toby.luckhurst@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

June 28, 2017 02:45 ET (06:45 GMT)

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