2008 Property Hotspots – Singapore and Bulgaria

The latest Knight Frank Global Price Index reveals that growth in residential property markets around the world is slowing. On an un-weighted basis prices globally rose by 8.2% per annum to Q3 2007 compared to 9.6% 12 months earlier. Rising interest rates have been a major factor in slowing house price growth, together with the tightening of lending criteria seen in many European countries.

The latest release of the Knight Frank Global house price index shows considerable changes from those seen in recent quarters, where the pattern of strong growth in Baltic markets was becoming almost routine. Latvia has been firmly knocked off the top spot by the recent EU newcomer – Bulgaria. Despite numerous concerns over the level of oversupply in a number of locations within Bulgaria – notably the winter ski resort of Bansko and selected coastal resort locations – Bulgaria has supplanted the previously top performing Baltic hotspot at the top of the Knight Frank league. Else where in Europe, German prices have continued to fall, where they Scandinavian market has remained robust.

The only Asian Pacific market which is not experiencing relatively strong rates of growth is Japan and the best performer in the region is Singapore.

The Canadian economy has remained relatively resilient in the face of disturbance in the US and price inflation has been around 10% And despite recent losses in some states, notably Michigan, California and Nevada (read Las Vegas) nationally, prices have only fallen 0.4%

Frank Knight Residential Research
The full report is available as a PDF download here

Emiliofero on Flickr
Credit for the stunning photograph at the top of the page