New ‘Official’ House Price Index in Spain

September 25th, 2008 at 7:54pm GMT

Spain will launch a new house price index on Oct. 1, the statistics institute said on Thursday.

The data will be an alternative to Housing Ministry figures which analysts have criticised for not reflecting the property market slump.

Spanish house prices declined 0.3 percent between April and June, while home sales fell 31.5 percent in the second quarter from last year, the Housing Ministry said earlier this month.

Real estate firms including Tinsa, Facilisimo and idealista.com estimate prices have slipped around 5 percent this year and some economists have said the value of Spanish real estate could drop by more than a third.

The new House Price Index (IPV) will report quarterly data on new and used homes, but the institute said it aims to report the data on a monthly basis and they could form part of Spain’s EU-harmonized inflation figures.

Story from Forbes