After many years in negative territory, Spanish house prices are once again on the rise, but not as fast as in other European countries, reveal the latest figures from Eurostat, the EU statistics office.
House prices in the EU rose by an average of 2.5% in the first quarter of the year, and by 0.9% in the Eurozone, show the Eurostat figures. In Spain, prices were up 1.6% in the same period (over 12 months), so price pressures are stronger in Spain than the Eurozone average, but less than the EU as a whole.
On a quarterly basis, between December 2014 and the end of March this year, house prices rose 0.6% on average in the EU as a whole, by 0.3% in the Eurozone, and fell by 0.5% in Spain.
An annualised increase of 1.6% in Spain looks good after years of house price declines, but in contrast to some other European countries, the recovery in Spain looks timid. In Q1 property prices rose 16.8% in Ireland, 11.6% in Sweden, 9.7% in Hungary, and 8.5% in the UK.
On the other hand, prices fell by 5.8% in Lithuania, 3.3% in Italy, 1.6% in France, and 1.4% in Slovenia.
Some people would question, with good reason, that house prices are actually rising in Spain, where official house prices figures don’t inspire much confidence.
