This is how much Crawley house prices changed in July and what the average price is

But the drop does not reverse the longer-term trend, which has seen property prices in the area achieve 3.8% annual growth.

The average Crawley house price in July was £288,560, Land Registry figures show – a 0.3% decrease on June.

Over the month, the picture was better than that across the South East, where prices decreased 1.3%, and Crawley outperformed the 3.7% drop for the UK as a whole.

Over the last year, the average sale price of property in Crawley rose by £10,000 – putting the area 65th among the South East’s 70 local authorities for annual growth.

The best annual growth in the region was in Hastings, where property prices increased on average by 23.6%, to £263,000. At the other end of the scale, properties in Swale gained 1% in value, giving an average price of £259,000.

Winners and Losers

Owners of terraced houses fared worst in Crawley in July – they dropped 0.5% in price, to £578,778 on average. But over the last year, prices rose by 4.2%.

Among other types of property:

Detached: remained level over the month; up 5.3% annually; £578,778 average

Semi-detached: remained level over the month; up 4.9% annually; £372,599 average

Flats: down 0.2% monthly; up 1.8% annually; £187,692 average

First steps on the property ladder

First-time buyers in Crawley spent an average of £260,100 on their property – £8,500 more than a year ago, and £19,400 more than in July 2016.

By comparison, former owner-occupiers paid £326,700 on average in July – 25.6% more than first-time buyers.

How do property prices in Crawley compare?

Buyers paid 18.5% less than the average price in the South East (£354,000) in July for a property in Crawley. Across the South East, property prices are higher than those across the UK, where the average cost £256,000.

The most expensive properties in the South East were in Elmbridge – £687,000 on average, and 2.4 times as much as in Crawley. Elmbridge properties cost 3.2 times as much as homes in Southampton (£217,000 average), at the other end of the scale.

The highest property prices across the UK were in Kensington and Chelsea, where the average July sale price of £1.3 million could buy 13 properties in Burnley (average £101,000).

Factfile

Average property price in July

Crawley: £288,560

The South East: £354,278

UK: £255,535

Annual growth to July

Crawley: +3.8%

The South East: +8.8%

UK: +8%

Best and worst annual growth in the South East

Hastings: +23.6%

Swale: +1.0%

Joanna Morris, Data Reporter