House price growth picked up again in April, the latest figures from Nationwide building society show.

Prices rose 0.9%, taking the annual rate of price inflation to 10.2% and pushing the average price of a home in the UK to £180,314.

However the Nationwide claimed that over the longer term, house price growth is beginning to cool.

Prices increased by 2% between February and April - the lowest three-monthly growth rate since last August.

"While the monthly rise in prices is stronger than the [Bank of England] would have liked to see, it can take some comfort from the fact that the underlying trend is softening," said Nationwide chief economist Fionnuala Earley.

The building society's figures confirm those of other surveys, such as those from the Halifax and the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, which have shown prices rising briskly this spring.

This latest increase in house prices is likely to increase the pressure on the Bank to raise interest rates, which are widely expected to go up by one quarter of a percentage point to 5.5% in May.

Yet Nationwide cautioned against the Bank pushing rates up to 6% and beyond, as it fears this could destabilise the property market.

"Too sharp a rate hike could undermine market confidence and dry demand up swiftly," Ms Earley warned.

She explained that previous price increases had been supported by resilient demand, but signs are emerging that this is beginning to wane.

First time buyer numbers fell by 3,200 between December and February, compared with the same period last year, Nationwide said.

It also argues that warnings of a crash in the property market are premature.

It says interest rates would have to rise by anther 2% before affordability for buyers became as stretched as it was before the property crash of the late 1980s, and is made more unlikely by the healthy state of the economy.

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