House sales volumes are up in Italy
House prices in Italy may still be depressed, but things are looking up for the country's housing market in 2017, at least as seen in the rising trend of residential property sales in the recent years. "The general tendency remains positive,” says Luca Dondi, Nomisma's general manager. Dondi noted that Nomisma saw a 16.3% y-o-y rise in transactions in 2016 and predicts a 7% increase in sales in 2017.
Property sales are one thing, but prices are another. House prices in Italy have been declining for around eight years, falling by around 16.9% (23.8% inflation-adjusted) from Q3 2008 to Q4 2016, based on ECB figures. In Q1 2017, prices of second-hand homes in Italy dropped by 5.7% y-o-y to €1,869 (US$ 2,048.61) per square metre (sq. m.), according to the real estate portal Idealista.it. The more comprehensive house price index produced by the European Central Bank (ECB) was slightly up by 0.21% during the year to Q4 2016. When adjusted for inflation, the index still fell by 0.01%.
