German property prices have fallen to record lows, but they continue to rise in Ljubljana

Germany saw its biggest fall in house prices since 2000 last year.
The German statistical bureau Destatis calculated that houses in urban areas fell the most, namely by 11 percent.
According to calculations by the German Federal Statistical Office Destatis, residential property prices in Germany (house price index) decreased by 8.4 percent compared to 2022.

Leading German real estate consultancy Colliers has published an analysis that has many potential home buyers wondering – should they buy or rent?

The analysis shows that those who rent a property of around 100 square meters in Germany will save an average of €4,300 per year compared to those who buy a property of the same size.

In large cities, the difference is even greater and amounts to about 7,100 euros per year, reports the Fenix-magazin website.

The German real estate market, especially the construction sector, has been very turbulent lately. Since the summer of 2022, the ratio of profitability of renting and purchasing apartments has completely changed. At the end of 2021, in 341 German districts (out of 401 existing in Germany), it was more economically profitable to buy housing. Then, that is, in 2022, buying real estate was still profitable - the purchase cost about 1,400 euros per year cheaper than living in a rented apartment area of 100 square meters. In Berlin, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Cologne, Munich and Stuttgart the difference was only about 600 euros per year.

According to influential economics institute Ifo, sentiment in Germany's property sector has never been so gloomy. When the ruling coalition came to power, it promised 400,000 new properties a year, but the reality has been completely different.

“The forecast for the coming months is grim,” said study leader Klaus Wohlrabe, dpa reports.

Builders are finding it difficult to get new business; more than half of the companies surveyed complained about a lack of contracts. The good news at least is that the number of cases of cancellations of already concluded deals has decreased.

New statistics: apartment prices in Ljubljana accelerated in the last quarter.
Property prices rose last year, but this is the lowest increase in three years; in Ljubljana in the last quarter there was again a significant increase in prices.

Residential property prices were 6.8 percent higher last year than a year earlier, the smallest price increase in three years. Residential property sales were about a quarter less than a year earlier, and in Ljubljana the sale of used apartments fell by a fifth, the State Statistics Office said.

Annual price growth of 6.8 percent was the lowest since 2021, when prices rose the most in years (15.8 percent).

Prices for new family homes rose the most last year (up 9.5 percent), followed by new apartments (up 8 percent), used family homes (up 7.9 percent) and second-hand apartments (up 5.9 percent). .

In the last quarter of last year, the volume of residential real estate used increased by 2.3 percent compared to the previous quarter. Prices for second-hand apartments rose by 3.6 percent and prices of second-hand family homes rose by 0.2 percent. In this comparison, prices for used apartments increased most significantly in Ljubljana (by 3.8 percent), followed by increases in the rest of Slovenia (by 3.1 percent) and in Maribor (by 2.9 percent).

New housing prices rose for the third time in a row on a quarterly basis in the last quarter, this time by three percent. Prices for new apartments increased by 3.5 percent, and for new cottages - by 1.4 percent.

The total value of residential property sold in 2023 was about 1.4 billion euros, about a fifth less than the year before. A total of 9,786 residential properties were sold, which is about a quarter less than in 2022.

In the latest quarter, the total value of all residential properties sold was €372.5 million, up about a tenth from the third quarter and about the same as in the final quarter of the previous year. A total of 2,420 residential properties were sold, which is the same as the previous quarter and approximately 15 percent less than in the last quarter of 2022.

The number of used residential property sales has remained roughly flat for three straight quarters. In the last quarter of last year, around 2,300 used residential properties were sold, with a total sales value of €331.3 million.

118 new residential properties were sold, with a total sales value of €41.2 million, up approximately 60 percent from the third quarter and 15 percent from the final quarter of the previous year.