EU house prices go up by 7.3% in Q2 2021
EditorialRoom 25th October 2021
In the second quarter of 2021, house prices, as measured by the House Price Index, rose by 6.8% in the euro area and by 7.3% in the EU compared with the same quarter of the previous year. This is the highest annual increase for the euro area since the fourth quarter of 2006, and since the third quarter of 2007 for the EU, Eurostat said. In the first quarter of 2021, house prices rose by 5.7% and 6.1% respectively. Compared with the first quarter of 2021, house prices rose by 2.6% in the euro area and 2.7% in the EU in the second quarter of 2021, the statistical office of the European Union added.
Among the Member States for which data are available, eleven showed an annual increase in house prices in the second quarter of 2021 of more than 10%. The highest annual increases were recorded in Estonia (+16.1%), Denmark (+15.6%) and Czechia (+14.5%), while prices fell only in Cyprus (-4.9%). Compared with the previous quarter, prices increased in all Member States. The highest increases were recorded in Latvia (+6.7%), Slovenia (+4.5%) and Austria (+4.2%).
(Source: Eurostat)
The House Price Index (HPI) measures the price changes of all residential properties purchased by households (flats, detached houses, terraced houses, etc.), both newly built and existing, independently of their final use and independently of their previous owners. The Member States’ HPIs are compiled by the National Statistical Institutes. The euro area and the EU aggregate HPIs are compiled by Eurostat. HPIs are computed as annually chained indices with weights being updated each year. The European HPI aggregates are currently calculated as weighted averages of the national HPIs using as weights the GDP at market prices (expressed in millions Purchasing Power Standards – PPS) of the countries concerned. The figures are not seasonally adjusted. Missing country data is estimated by Eurostat using data from non-harmonised sources. These estimates are not published but are used to calculate euro area and EU aggregates.