Estonia house prices up as eurozone falls

Photo: Vikkies

Property markets around Europe are starting to improve following the financial crisis, but the continent still has a long way to go to recover, with prices falling both annually and quarterly, according to data from Eurostat.

Property prices within the European Union were down 0.5 per cent annually, the EU's official statistical office reveals, and decreased 0.7 per cent from  the second quarter of 2013. In the eurozone, prices fell 0.6 per cent quarter-on-quarter.

Estonia bucked the trend with the biggest year-on-year price rise. Luxembourg followed with apartment prices jumping 6.5 per cent year-on-year. Latvia prices rose 6.2 per cent.

Croatia, on the other hand, led the annual decline, with prices falling 16.9 per cent year-on-year, followed by Cyprus and Spain, where prices fell 8 per cent and 6.4 per cent respectively.

On a quarterly level, though, Estonia's lead increase of 5.3 per cent was followed by Ireland and the UK, who enjoyed three-month rises of 4.1 per cent and 2.5 per cent respectively. (On an annual level, they enjoyed price rises of 3.7 per cent and 3.6 per cent.)

Slovenia led the quarterly decreases with a dip of 4 per cent, followed by Denmark's drop of 3.3 per cent.

Spain's slipping prices, though, began to slow down in the third quarter of 2013, accordingt o Eurostat, with prices falling 0.8 per cent quarter-on-quarter, the same as the three months to June 2013 and a significant improvement upon the 5.1 per cent quarterly plung recorded in the first three months of 2013.
 
Portugal also enjoyed improvements in house prices, with declines slowing down to 0.4 per cent in the third quarter compared to a decline of 0.9 per cent in the second quarter, while French real estate values reversed a 1.2 per cent decline in the first quarter of 2013 with a 1.2 per cent rise in the third quarter.