There were three pieces of data lurking amongst the latest housing survey from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) that give ground for optimism.

First off, the RICS headline index for December rose to its highest level since February 2008. You will probably recall, every month RICS asks its members a number of questions; among then, did house prices go up or down last month. They produce their headline index by taking the percentage who said down and take that away from the percentage number who said up.

Now, don’t get carried away. The RICS index is still pretty awful. Its latest score comes in at minus 73.5. Drill into the data and the picture that emerges is not so good. No less than 84 per cent of members said prices were down on the previous month – on a non seasonally adjusted basis.

So, yes, the RICS headline index is getting better – but it needs to get quite a bit better than that before we can start hailing a recovery. Even so, it’s a step in the right direction.

The second bit of good news came in the shape of a rise in the number of new buyer enquiries. It was the second monthly rise in new buyer enquires in a row, but more to the point, the improvement in the RICS index for new buyer enquiries represented the fastest pace of improvement since August 2006.

The final good news comes in the form of data to show that the stock of property for sale has fallen over the last few months. In fact, the stock of property for sale is just 1.1 per cent up on this time last year.

Well, let’s hope you enjoyed that rare beam of sunshine on the housing market. This is where the ‘yes, buts’ begin.

Yes, the RICS headline index improved, but the index for plotting estate agents’ expectations for prices fell to its lowest level since April, which itself was the lowest level in a very long time. The expectation index fell in nine out of ten regions.

Yes, there was a rise in new buyer enquiries, but sales per surveyor fell to the lowest level on record – and RICS data goes all the way back to 1978.

Perhaps the index which provides the greatest indicator of when we can expect a recovery, though, is the sales to stock ratio. Sales came in at 10.1 per surveyor over the last three months. The stock of property stood at 78.1. This takes the ratio of stock to quarterly sales to 12.9 per cent, the lowest level since 1992.

It seems to us, that as prices fall, some people find themselves tempted to move. They see how prices have fallen, and clinging to the notion that prices always go up in the long term, find the pull of buying again quite attractive. They are, if you like, flirting with the idea of moving.

But converting all this flirtatiousness into actual sales is another matter entirely. At the lower prices, houses for sale might look sexy again, but the reality of the shortage of credit, meaning mortgages are hard to come by, and the reality of the threat of job losses, will act like a medieval chastity belt.

We are currently seeing two forces collide. They say faith can move mountains. And in the UK the public do have enormous faith in the idea that house prices always go up, and that an investment in your home is the safest and most savvy investment you can make. Against that is the reality that house prices rose too high several years ago, and that they were propelled upwards by a speculative bubble. It is not easy to predict how the clashing of these two forces will pan out on a month by month basis. Just as shares saw a number of bull runs in rows in 2008, and for that matter just as the Dow peaked in October 2007 – several months after the credit crunch started to bite – it seems likely we will see the odd improvement in buyer sentiment, as cheaper houses look hard to resist. But it seems that harsh economic reality is likely to win out.

The really big ‘yes, but,’ however, is associated with the news that the stock of property for sales has improved. RICS itself hinted at this ‘but,’ by saying: “Stock levels fell through the course of 2008 as vendors turned to the rental market, opting to let their property in the face of the weak sales market.” You see, stock levels are improving because would-be sellers are letting their properties instead of selling them. You may recall one of the arguments made against the possibility that house prices would fall is that as houses become less affordable, demand for properties to let would rise, pushing up rental yields making buy-to-let more profitable, driving up house prices. We are instead finding the opposite, and it seems rental yields and house prices are set to fall in tandem.