House prices and activity in the UK market have been rising in recent months
UK house prices continued to rise at a "fairly brisk pace" in August, increasing by 0.6% compared with July, the Nationwide said.
The building society said that property prices were up by 3.5% compared with a year earlier, although August 2012 was a slow month.
The average home was valued at £170,514, it said.
Greater consumer confidence, owing to more employment and signs of economic recovery, helped push up prices.
The building society's chief economist, Robert Gardner, added that greater availability of cheaper mortgages had also increased activity in the market.
The three-month on three-month comparison in prices, regarded as a less volatile measure of property prices, recorded a 1.4% rise.
This was the biggest increase since mid-2010, the Nationwide said.
Source: BBC News - Business http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23886149#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa
