August has been the weakest month in the last half year on the real estate market with only 11066 transactions according to the data published by Duna House. In the meantime real estate prices remain in a continuously increasing trend.
Experts say that August may have produced the lowest volume in the number of transactions in the housing market, the slight decline is only seasonal. According to Duna House the same period last year showed a 19 percent decline in transaction numbers, and two years ago the number of sold properties was barely above 7000.
Almost 92 thousand transactions were closed in the first eight months of the year – which is already more than the complete number of transactions in several of the post-crisis years. Last year only 64 thousand transactions were closed in eight months which is 30 less.
According to the FHB Housing Price Index another factor may play into the slowdown in August despite it is largely clearly the effect of the seasonality. Prices on the market significantly increased in the first quarter of 2015 – 9 percent in terms of real prices and 8.2 percent if we look at nominal prices.
Average prices on the market are now nearly equivalent to the prices of the pre-crisis year of 2005 and they are only 10 percent lower than they were immediately before financial crisis hit the market.
Overall prices are usually reduced by the appearance of newly built estates on the market as they expand supply on the market, but in recent years constructions were not getting up to speed. The growth has been continuous in the real estate market for more than a year now however and this seems to have influenced the construction industry positively.
Only in the first quarter of the year more than 5500 construction permits were issued in Hungary, which is clearly a higher number than in previous years. In 2014 for example 44% less permits were issued in the same period. If we look at the second quarter the increase is still significantly large around 36%.
The home loan market is currently strong according to experts, total value of active loans between April and June was more than 80 billion Forints. June provided the highest numbers, this was the month when the total value of new loans passed 32.5 billion Forints, but values were also high in the rest of the quarter, exceeding 20 billion Forints per month.
Total value of active loans continued to grow in July, the increase was more than 40 percent compared to July 2014 and 10 percent compared to June this year. Meanwhile the average fee for housing loans shows a steady decline: in July the average annualized interest rate weighed by the contractual value was 5.3 percent, while the fee for housing loans was 5.75 percent.
The market has been getting stronger continuously for the last year and experts say that the trend is likely to continue. In 2015 the total number of transactions can pass 150 thousand, which would be approximately 50 percent higher than in last year.
(Source: http://www.penzcentrum.hu/otthon/ennyivel_nottek_a_lakasarak_csak_az_elmult_egy_evben.1046223.html
http://www.portfolio.hu/ingatlan/lakas/a_nyar_vegere_kisse_elfaradtak_a_lakasvasarlok.4.218912.html)
