The monthly housing survey by the online estate agency found the market was strengthened by the south-east, but stock levels were at their lowest level for 18 months.
The average house price is now £223,996, with Rightmove saying the property market is being greatly influenced by lenders' caution driving sales in the affluent south, and 'would-be sellers deterred from trading up by dwindling property choice and high deposit requirements'.
The Rightmove HPI is based on asking prices rather than completions, and this month showed ten properties were coming off the market for every eight coming on, with 29 per cent more properties coming off the market than coming to the market.
Miles Shipside, commercial director of Rightmove, said: 'The recession appears to have hit prices harder in the north, and this is compounded by lenders' more conservative attitude to risk.
'Lenders quite naturally prefer to lend to lower risk borrowers in better locations, with better job security, larger deposits and more resilient property values. Indeed it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy, keeping the best areas more buoyant and making it harder for depressed areas to bounce back.'
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