Forecast predicts how house and oil prices might trigger recession

Last Modified: 25 Jul 2008
By: Channel 4 News

How much would house prices have to fall or the oil price rise to tip the UK into recession?

Channel 4 News asked analysts Oxford Economics to forecast a recession led by falling house prices or a rising oil price.

The figures below show Oxford Economics' forecast of growth, inflation, house prices, interest rates and the oil price until the end of 2009.

Growth is predicted to remain slow, but the country would stay out of recession.

The "UK in recession figures" show the annual and quarterly figures house price and oil price figures that would give two successive quarters of negative economic growth.

According to the predictions, an annual house price fall of 3.8 per cent in 2008 and 19.9 per cent in 2009, or an increase in the oil price to $170 a barrel, would see a recession starting early next year.

If both of these factors occurred together, the country could be looking at five quarters of negative economic growth, starting at the end of 2008.