House prices (provisional)

The House Price Index (HPI) measures the evolution of market prices of all residential properties that are purchased by households (flats, detached houses, terraced houses, etc.), both new and existing, independently if bought for own-occupancy or as an investment.

In 2018 the  entire  HPI  time  series  has  been  revised  to  reflect  the  shift to a new database provided by Tax Office that improves the accuracy of the indices and their timeliness. Moreover, the new data source allows the production of HPIs for geographical areas and for a few big towns: these new indicators will be disseminated starting from the next press release.

According to preliminary estimates, in the first quarter of 2018:

• the House Price Index (IPAB) decreased by 0.1% compared with the previous quarter and by 0.4% in comparison to the same quarter of the previous year (it was -1.2% in the fourth quarter of 2017) (table 1);
• prices of new dwellings decreased by 1.3% compared to the previous quarter and increased by 1.3% with respect to the same quarter of 2017 (up from +0.2% observed in the last quarter); prices of existing dwellings increased by 0.2% compared to the previous quarter and decreased by 0.8% with respect to the same quarter of the previous year;
• with the release of HPI for the first quarter of 2018, corresponding weights are disseminated. In particular, the weight of new dwellings amounts to about 19% (it was 35% in 2010) against about 81% for existing dwellings.