Housing prices continued to rise at the same rate as the previous quarter and grew by 8.7% in the second quarter of the year on a year-on-year basis, as reported by the National Institute of Statistics (INE) last Thursday.

During this period, existing home prices increased at a faster pace than new homes, with increases of 9% and 8%, respectively," the institute details.

In relation to the previous quarter, the housing price index increased by 3.1%, compared to a quarterly increase of 1.3% in the first three months of the year. Once again, by category, existing home prices saw an increase of 3.2%, surpassing new homes (2.8%).

Despite the increase in property prices, the number of real estate transactions and their total value declined during the period between April and June 2023 when compared to the same period in 2022. During this interval, a total of 33,624 residential properties were transacted, amounting to a total value of 6.9 billion euros. This represents a decrease of 22.9% and 16.9%, respectively, in year-on-year terms.

In the second quarter of this year, families acquired 28,732 residential properties with a total value of 5.8 billion euros, constituting the majority both in nominal terms (85.5%) and in terms of the overall transaction amount (83.8%).

The housing transactions involving buyers with a tax residence outside the national territory amounted to 2,535 units (7.5% of the total), representing a year-on-year reduction of 8.9%, as reported by the INE.