Press Releases

Indices of house prices and residential property transactions: Q2 2013

02/08/2013 - Press Releases

According to data collected from credit institutions,(1) nominal apartment prices are estimated to have declined on average by 11.6% year-on-year in the second quarter of 2013. Moreover, based on revised data, apartment prices fell at an average annual rate of 11.3% in the first quarter of 2013, whereas for the whole of 2012 the corresponding decline was 11.7% (Q1: -10.6%, Q2: -10.8%, Q3: -12.6% and Q4: -13.0%), compared with 5.5% in 2011.

Apartment prices by age and geographical area

More specifically, the year-on-year rates of decline in prices were 11.3% for "new" apartments, (i.e. up to 5 years old) and 11.8% for "old" apartments (i.e. over 5 years old) in the second quarter of 2013. For the first quarter of 2013, based on revised data, the corresponding rates of decline were 10.3% for "new" apartments and 12.0% for "old" ones, while in 2012 as a whole the average declines in prices were 12.1% (2011: -5,0%) for "new" apartments and 11.4% for "old" apartments (2011: -5.8%).

According to data broken down by geographical area, apartment prices are estimated to have declined year-on-year in the second quarter of 2013 by 12.7% in Athens, 10.5% in Thessaloniki, 11.5% in other cities and 10.0% in other areas of Greece; for 2012 as a whole, the corresponding rates of decline were 11.8%, 13.6%, 10.7% and 11.7% respectively, according to revised data.

More detailed tables on house prices by geographical area (Athens, Thessaloniki, other cities and other areas) and with a break data into “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) and are also available on the Bank of Greece’s website.

Indices of residential property appraisals-transactions (2)

Residential property appraisals-transactions conducted with Monetary Financial Institution intermediation for any reason (credit for house purchase, registration of a mortgage to back non-housing loans, debt transfers from one bank to another, etc.) came to 4.5 thousand in the second quarter of 2013, down from 5.6 thousand in the previous quarter. Year-on-year, the number of residential property appraisals fell by 35.3% in the second quarter of 2013; in 2012 as a whole this number reached 30.4 thousand (revised data), down by a substantial 29.1% from 42.8 thousand in 2011.

The volume of residential property appraisals-transactions (measured by total square metre area) declined by 36.3% year-on-year in the second quarter of 2013 and, based on revised data, at an average annual rate of 28.1% in 2012 as a whole.

Finally, the value of residential property appraisals-transactions conducted with Monetary Financial Institution intermediation dropped by 42.7% year-on-year in the second quarter of 2013. In 2012, the average annual rate of change was -37.1% (revised data).

INDICES OF APARTMENT PRICES (1)
	2011	2012*	2012*				2013*
			Q1	Q2	Q3*	Q4*	Q1*	Q2*
Ι. Summary
Price index	88.2	77.9	81.5	79.7	76.6	73.9	72.3	70.5
(%) change over previous year	-5.5%	-11.7%	-10.6%	-10.8%	-12.6%	-13.0%	-11.3%	-11.6%
II. BY AGE
1.  New (up to 5 years old)
Price index	91.2	80.1	82.8	81.3	78.9	77.5	74.3	72.1
(%) change over previous year	-5.0%	-12.1%	-11.7%	-11.7%	-13.6%	-11.2%	-10.3%	-11.3%
2.  Old (over 5 years old)
Price index	86.4	76.5	80.7	78.7	75.2	71.6	71.0	69.4
(%) change over previous year	-5.8%	-11.4%	-9.8%	-10.2%	-11.8%	-14.1%	-12.0%	-11.8%
ΙΙΙ. BY GEOGRAPHICAL AREA
1.  Athens
Price index	87.2	76.9	80.9	78.2	76.0	72.6	70.6	68.3
(%) change over previous year	-6.4%	-11.8%	-10.2%	-11.4%	-12.6%	-13.1%	-12.6%	-12.7%
2.  Thessaloniki
Price index	82.4	71.2	73.8	73.4	69.0	68.5	68.5	65.7
(%) change over previous year	-6.8%	-13.6%	-13.0%	-13.8%	-14.6%	-12.9%	-7.2%	-10.5%
3.  Other cities
Price index	89.9	80.2	83.4	82.0	79.2	76.4	73.9	72.5
(%) change over previous year	-4.1%	-10.7%	-9.8%	-9.8%	-11.0%	-12.4%	-11.4%	-11.5%
4.  Other areas of Greece
Price index	91.2	80.6	84.2	83.2	78.6	76.2	75.7	74.9
(%) change over previous year	-4.4%	-11.7%	-11.0%	-9.5%	-13.2%	-13.3%	-10.2%	-10.0%
INDICES OF HOUSE APPRAISALS-TRANSACTIONS WITH MONETARY FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS INTERMEDIATION (2)
	2011	2012*	2012*				2013*
			Q1	Q2	Q3*	Q4*	Q1*	Q2*
1.  Appraisals-transactions
Number of appraisals-transactions	42,814	30,352	6,594	6,928	5,691	11,139	5,563	4,484
(%) change over previous year	-42.5%	-29.1%	-48.5%	-42.5%	-41.4%	35.0%	-15.6%	-35.3%
2.  Volume of appraisals-transactions (total m2)
Volume index (2007=100)	28.1	20.2	17.7	18.5	15.2	29.5	14.8	11.8
(%) change over previous year	-39.8%	-28.1%	-46.9%	-41.3%	-40.5%	33.6%	-16.4%	-36.3%
3.  Value of appraisals-transactions
Value index (2007=100)	27.0	17.0	16.1	15.8	12.7	23.2	11.5	9.0
(%) change over previous year	-40.1%	-37.1%	-51.0%	-48.4%	-47.1%	13.7%	-28.6%	-42.7%

* Provisional data.
Source: Bank of Greece.

(1) Bank of Greece indices of house prices and of the number and volume of residential property appraisals-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 613.208 appraisals were reported to the Bank of Greece (by end-July 2013) (67.0% concerning apartments, 19.4% houses, 5.9% maisonettes, 5.6% building plots, and 2.1% other types of property).
(2) The indices of residential property appraisals-transactions are based on appraisal reports by banks’ engineers regarding the value and qualitative characteristics of residential property financed by, or used as collateral for, bank loans. Part of these appraisals may 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.