Press Releases

Indices of house prices and residential property transactions: Q1 2013

09/05/2013 - Press Releases

According to data collected from credit institutions,(1) nominal apartment prices are estimated to have declined on average by 11.5% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2013. According to revised data, the average annual rate of change was -11.7% in 2012 (Q1: -10.6%, Q2: -10.7%, Q3: -12.5% and Q4: -13.1%), compared with -5.5% in 2011.

Apartment prices by age and geographical area

More specifically, the year-on-year rate of decline in prices was 10.8% for "new" apartments (i.e. up to 5 years old) and 11.9% for "old" apartments (i.e. over 5 years old) in the first quarter of 2013. In 2012 as a whole the average rate of decline in prices for "new" apartments was 12.0% (2011: -5,0%), whereas for "old" apartments the respective rate was 11.5% (2011: -5.8%).

According to data broken down by geographical area, apartment prices are estimated to have declined year-on-year in the first quarter of 2013 by 12.6% in Athens, 8.2% in Thessaloniki, 11.0% in other cities and 10.9% in other areas of Greece. According to revised data, 2012 prices dropped on average year-on-year by 11.8%, 13.4%, 10.9% and 11.7% respectively in the above-mentioned areas. These figures show that during the last two years the prices of apartments registered stronger declines in the two major urban centres, Athens and Thessaloniki, compared with other regions.

More detailed tables on house prices by geographical area (Athens, Thessaloniki, other cities and other areas), which also distinguish between “new” (up to 5 years old) and “old” (over 5 years old) apartments, are published in the “Bulletin of Conjunctural Indicators” (Tables ΙΙ.7.1 and ΙΙ.7.2), available on the Bank of Greece’s website:

http://www.bankofgreece.gr/RelatedDocuments/NEW_INDEX_OF_APARTMENT_PRICES_BY_GEOGRAPHICAL_AREA.PDF

Indices of residential property appraisals- transactions (2)

Residential property appraisals-transactions conducted with Monetary Financial Institution intermediation for any reason (renegotiation of existing loans, registration of a mortgage to back non-housing loans, debt transfers from one bank to another, etc.) came to 4,976 in the first quarter of 2013, down from 10,506 in the previous quarter. Year-on-year, residential property appraisals fell by 24.5% in the first quarter of 2013. The number of appraisals in 2012 reached 29,584 (revised data), following a significant drop of 30.9% year-on-year (2011: 42,814).

The volume of appraisals-transactions in terms of total square metres of the underlying residential property declined by 26.2% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2013, and for the whole of 2012, based on revised data, this volume declined at an average annual rate of 30.1%.

Finally, the value of residential property appraisals-transactions conducted with Monetary Financial Institution intermediation dropped by 34.6% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2013. In 2012, the average annual rate of change was -38.6% (revised data).

 

INDICES OF APARTMENT PRICES (1)
	2010	2011	2012*	2012 *				2013 *
				Q1	Q2*	Q3*	Q4*	Q1*
Ι. Summary
Price index	93.3	88.2	77.9	81.5	79.8	76.6	73.7	72.2
(%) change over previous year	-4.7%	-5.5%	-11.7%	-10.6%	-10.7%	-12.5%	-13.1%	-11.5%
II. BY AGE
1.  New (up to 5 years old)
Price index	96.0	91.2	80.2	82.8	81.5	78.9	77.5	73.9
(%) change over previous year	-4.2%	-5.0%	-12.0%	-11.7%	-11.6%	-13.6%	-11.3%	-10.8%
2.  Old (over 5 years old)
Price index	91.7	86.4	76.5	80.7	78.8	75.2	71.4	71.1
(%) change over previous year	-5.0%	-5.8%	-11.5%	-9.8%	-10.1%	-11.8%	-14.3%	-11.9%
ΙΙΙ. BY GEOGRAPHICAL AREA
1.  Athens
Price index	93.2	87.2	77.0	80.9	78.3	76.0	72.6	70.7
(%) change over previous year	-3.2%	-6.4%	-11.8%	-10.2%	-11.3%	-12.6%	-13.0%	-12.6%
2.  Thessaloniki
Price index	88.4	82.4	71.4	73.8	74.3	68.9	68.5	67.7
(%) change over previous year	-7.4%	-6.8%	-13.4%	-13.0%	-12.8%	-14.8%	-12.9%	-8.2%
3.  Other cities
Price index	93.7	89.9	80.1	83.4	81.8	78.7	76.4	74.2
(%) change over previous year	-5.3%	-4.1%	-10.9%	-9.8%	-9.9%	-11.5%	-12.4%	-11.0%
4.  Other areas of Greece
Price index	95.4	91.2	80.5	84.2	83.4	79.0	75.5	75.0
(%) change over previous year	-5.8%	-4.4%	-11.7%	-11.0%	-9.4%	-12.7%	-14.1%	-10.9%
INDICES OF HOUSE APPRAISALS-TRANSACTIONS WITH MONETARY FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS INTERMEDIATION (2)
	2010	2011	2012*	2012 *				2013 *
				Q1	Q2*	Q3*	Q4*	Q1*
1.  Appraisals-transactions
Number of appraisals-transactions	74,457	42,814	29,584	6,594	6,861	5,623	10,506	4,976
(%) change over previous year	-0.2%	-42.5%	-30.9%	-48.5%	-43.0%	-42.1%	27.3%	-24.5%
2.  Volume of appraisals-transactions (total m2)
Volume index (2007=100)	46.7	28.1	19.6	17.7	18.0	14.9	27.9	13.0
(%) change over previous year	-0.1%	-39.8%	-30.1%	-46.9%	-42.7%	-41.6%	-26.4%	-26.2%
3.  Value of appraisals-transactions
Value index (2007=100)	45.0	27.0	16.6	16.1	15.5	12.6	22.0	10.6
(%) change over previous year	-6.2%	-40.1%	-38.6%	-51.0%	-49.2%	-47.6%	7.7%	-34.6%

 

* Provisional data.

Source: Bank of Greece.

 

(1) Bank of Greece indices of house prices and of the number and volume of residential property transactions use detailed data reported to the Bank of Greece by all credit institutions operating in Greece. These data are compiled by the Real Estate Market Analysis Section of the Bank of Greece as from 2009, under Bank of Greece Governor’s Act 2610/31.10.2008, and include banks’ appraisals of the current market value and qualitative characteristics of residential property. A total of about 607,114 appraisals were reported to the Bank of Greece (by end-April 2013) (67.1% concerning apartments, 19.4% houses, 5.87% maisonettes, 5.6% building plots, and 2.1% other types of property).

(2) The indices of residential property transactions are based on appraisal reports by banks’ engineers regarding the value and qualitative characteristics of residential property financed or used as collateral for loans extended by credit institutions. Part of these appraisals might not be associated with residential property transactions, but concern the renegotiation of existing loans, registration of a mortgage to back non-housing loans, debt transfers from one bank to another, etc.