House prices vs rents

You might have thought there would be a relationship between the rate at which house prices change and changes in the cost of renting a private property. If there is, it’s a very minor correlation, based on these statistics from the ONS. Here’s London house price inflation vs London private rental price inflation.

And here’s the comparable chart for England as a whole:

A note of caution – the rental data are experimental statistics from the ONS and cover the entire rental market, not just newly-agreed rents. The house price data are from the standard ONS series.