Property analysts are tentatively talking about the bottom of the market after house prices posted their first monthly rise since October 2007. Nationwide building society said prices jumped 0.9% in March, following a 1.9% drop in February. The news came days after mortgage approvals were reported to have jumped by almost a fifth.

There are signs of a turnround for stocks, too. The FTSE 100 surged nearly 200 points on Thursday after the G20 agreed a trillion-dollar deal to rescue the global economy, while assets associated with recovery — commodities, smaller companies and emerging markets — bounced back.

China’s Shanghai Composite index has risen 15.6% and Japan’s Nikkei 225 is up 10.4% in the past month, Fortis Private Bank said. Yet some experts remain bearish. Capital Economics and Global Insight think the British property market will fall another 19% and 14% respectively. Prices are down 20.9%, despite March’s rebound. Fund manager Artemis remains “cautious” on stocks. European firms have seen earnings forecasts cut by 30% since the start of this year, it said, while the FTSE 100 is down only 9% — so it has yet to catch up.

Here, we look at what the signals are telling us — whether they are red, amber or green — and what you should buy to profit from recovery when it comes.

PROPERTY

First-time buyers yet to return

Affordability is improving as house prices fall and rate cuts bring mortgage costs lower, but it is still not back to the levels at the bottom of the last house-price downturn in the 1990s.

Nationwide’s index of first-time buyer house prices in relation to their average earnings still stands at 4.1 — almost double the 2.1 it stood at in 1996.

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development said last week that house prices were still far above their historic average — suggesting that they had “a way to go” to return to affordability.

Consumer confidence grows

Confidence in the housing market has been bottoming out since the start of the year. Last month, it returned to levels not seen in six months, Propertyfinder, a website, said. Having said that, its March survey of 2,075 home-buyers and sellers showed that 61.5% of people expected prices to fall in the next 12 months, against 75% in December.

Charles Wasdell at Propertyfinder said: “While joblessness continues to rise, we should expect the housing market to be subdued, but we’ve turned a corner. Recovery is still a long way off, but we seem to be finally heading in the right direction.”