(www.thegaurdian.com) – Property prices up by 0.8% in second quarter of year compared with same period in 2013, according to official figures.
House prices in Spain have shown an annual rise for the first time in six years, in the latest sign of the country’s economic recovery.
Prices were up 0.8% in the second quarter of the year compared with the same period in 2013, according to the country’s National Statistics Institute.
The rise follows as 1.6% fall in the first quarter of 2014 and comes after prices plummeted in the country with the bursting of a decade-long property bubble. House prices last rose year-on-year in the first quarter of 2008, according to INE data.
The prices of newly built houses rose most, up 1.9%, while for other properties the rise was 0.2%, the highest increase since the fourth quarter of 2007.
In 2006 at the height of Spain’s construction boom the sector accounted for more than 13% of national output. Since then, house prices have contracted by more a third and about 1.7 million construction workers have lost their jobs.
Data from real estate website Fotocasa.es this month showed a monthly increase in prices of 1%, the largest rise in eight years.
Fotocasa, which is considered to offer more up-to-date information than INE, said house prices have fallen by 43.9% since they hit a peak of €2.952 a square metre in April 2007.
Read More: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/08/spanish-house-price-first-rise-in-six-years
