LONDON, April 14 (Reuters) - - Britain's housing market looks set for a soft patch in the run-up to June's referendum on European Union membership, surveyors said on Thursday, forecasting the slowest house price growth in almost a year.
The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors said its members still saw strong underlying price pressures.
But in the near term they forecast prices would slow due to tax rises on rental properties, June's referendum and Scottish and Welsh elections in May, while sales volumes were expected to dip for the first time since 2008.
RICS said its monthly house price balance fell to a nine-month low of +42 last month from +50 in February, below all forecasts in a Reuters poll of economists.
Property website Rightmove reported earlier this week that interest from prospective landlords had dropped by more than a quarter compared with a year ago due to tax changes.
"As expected, the buy-to-let rush has now run its course, and as a natural result, the market is starting to slow," Simon Rubinsohn, chief economist at RICS, said.
As of April 1, buy-to-let investors and second homeowners must pay an additional 3 percent stamp duty on new purchases compared with first-time buyers.
He added that there were other "significant" factors hitting short-term confidence.
"Elections inevitably bring with them periods of uncertainty in the market, and our figures would suggest that next May’s devolved elections are no exception. Likewise, the EU referendum, is likely to be an influencer in terms of the damper outlook for London in particular," he added.
RICS's index for price increases over the next three months was +17 in March from +21 in February, its lowest since April 2015, just before May 2015's national election which some polls had wrongly suggested could bring the opposition Labour Party to power.
Over the long-term, prices are still expected to rise more than 4 percent each year for the next five years across England and Wales, the survey said, as demand in Britain's housing market continues to outweigh supply.
sales rose for a fourth consecutive month although at a much slower rate than earlier in the year, according to the survey, while near-term sales expectations dipped into negative territory for the first time since 2008.
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