Home sales in London and Brighton are among the areas of England leading the statistics which show a continuing slow recovery in the residential conveyancing property market.

Bank of England figures reveal mortgage approvals have also risen between April and March.

According to the Land Registry, average home prices in London have gone up from £297,473 in April 2009 to £341,487 a year later.

Brighton and Hove shows a similar trend in the same period with the average purchase cost of £188,522 increasing to £220,219.

The average UK home is now selling for £169,162.

In April 2010, 49,871 home loans were approved, valued in total at £6.9 billion, which was up from 49,008 approvals and £6.7 billion in March, although April's figures were less than the average £7.2 billion-worth of lending on 53,098 properties from October 2009 to March 2010.

Commenting on the lending figures, the director general of the Council of Mortgage Lenders Michael Coogan said that house purchase activity was lower at the beginning of 2010 than at the end of 2009, due to the stamp duty ‘holiday'. Low interest rates were having an effect on the number of home-owners wishing to remortgage.

He said,"The forthcoming Budget represents an opportunity for the Government to prioritise support for home-owners, although we recognise the fiscal position leaves only limited room for manoeuvre. We will update our forecasts later in the summer."

According to the latest national home sales survey by the Nationwide, prices are rising slowly because of the relative scarcity of properties for sale but, since the trough of February 2009, prices are only 9.5% below the October 2007 peak of residential conveyancing.