Compared with the same quarter of the previous year, house prices in Malta showed the highest increases among all Mediterranean countries with an increase of 6.2% in Q4 2018.
The House Price Index published by Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union, shows an increase in house prices of 4.2% in both the euro area and the EU in the fourth quarter of 2018, compared with the same quarter of the previous year. Compared with the third quarter of 2018, house prices rose by 0.7% in the euro area and by 0.6% in the EU in the fourth quarter of 2018.
When seen from a regional perspective, house prices are falling in the largest central European countries such as France, Belgium, Italy, United Kingdom, Sweden and Denmark, whilst property prices in Eastern European countries are showing the highest increases as these economies continue to catch up with the rest of Europe.
The euro area consists of Belgium, Germany, Estonia, Ireland, Greece, Spain, France, Italy, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Austria, Portugal, Slovenia, Slovakia and Finland.
The European Union includes Belgium, Bulgaria, Czechia, Denmark, Germany, Estonia, Ireland, Greece, Spain, France,
Croatia, Italy, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Hungary, Malta, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Romania,
Slovenia, Slovakia, Finland, Sweden and the United Kingdom.
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. The House Price Index data refers to the euro area and EU country compositions at a specific point in time. New Member States are integrated into the aggregates using a chain index formula.
Source: Eurostat
