In the fourth quarter of 2023, house prices, as measured by the House Price Index, fell by 1.1% in the euro area and rose by 0.2% in the EU compared with the same quarter of the previous year. In the third quarter of 2023, house prices fell by 2.2% and 1.1% in the euro area and EU, respectively. These figures come from Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union.
Compared with the third quarter of 2023, house prices fell by 0.7% in the euro area and by 0.3% in the EU in the fourth quarter of 2023.
Among the Member States for which data are available, eight showed an annual decrease in house prices in the fourth quarter of 2023, and eighteen showed an annual increase. The largest falls were registered in Luxembourg (-14.4%), Germany (-7.1%) and Finland (-4.4%), while the highest increases were recorded in Poland (+13.0%), Bulgaria (+10.1%) and Croatia (+9.5%).
Compared with the previous quarter, prices decreased in eleven Member States, were stable in one (Italy) and increased in fourteen Member States. The largest falls were registered in France (-2.7%), Latvia (-2.5%) as well as Denmark and Sweden (both -2.3%), while the highest increases were recorded in Poland (+4.8%), Croatia (+3.4%) and Ireland (+3.0%).
Notes for users
Country notes
Belgium: The HPI have been revised for between Q1 2005 and Q3 2023 due to changes in the weights for new and existing dwellings, aggregation procedure and hedonic method (see also country methodological note).
Netherlands: The HPI and weights have been revised between Q1 2015 and Q3 2023 due to the implementation of several changes aimed at aligning calculation of weights for new and existing dwellings with implementing regulation 2023/1470 and improving index compilation methodology (see also country methodological note).
Austria: The HPI and weights have been revised between Q1 2010 and Q3 2023 due to several improvements, which include, among other, data processing improvements, exclusion of prefabricated houses and inclusion of transaction prices as the basis for the calculation of the price index for newly built dwellings, refinements in the hedonic repricing method, and alignment of calculation of weights for new and existing dwellings with the implementing regulation 2023/1470 (see also country methodological note).
Revisions and timetable
Compared with €-indicators release of 10 January 2024, revisions for the euro area and the EU are highlighted in bold in the table below:
|
Revisions |
||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Q1 2023 |
Q2 2023 |
Q3 2023 |
||||
|
Quarterly changes |
Previous |
Current |
Previous |
Current |
Previous |
Current |
|
-0.8 |
-0.9 |
0.2 |
0.2 |
0.3 |
0.2 |
|
|
-0.7 |
-0.7 |
0.4 |
0.5 |
0.8 |
0.7 |
|
|
Annual changes |
||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
0.4 |
0.4 |
-1.5 |
-1.6 |
-2.1 |
-2.2 |
|
|
0.8 |
0.8 |
-0.9 |
-1.0 |
-1.0 |
-1.1 |
|
The next release with data (first quarter of 2024) is scheduled for 5 July 2024.
Methods and definitions
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.
Geographical information
Euro area (EA20): Belgium, Germany, Estonia, Ireland, Greece, Spain, France, Croatia, Italy, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Austria, Portugal, Slovenia, Slovakia and Finland.
European Union (EU27): 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 and Sweden.
