Housing prices in Europe - signals of a beginning downturn in many countries!?

The Covid Crisis affected nearly all European countries. In contrast, house prices continued their upswing without any exception across European Countries. However, in line with the economic recovery coming to an end from summer 2022, signals for the end of the house price bubbles could be seen as well. How did the housing markets in European countries develop during the Covid crisis and how were they affected by various shocks (Ukraine war, supply shortages and increasing inflation) the following year? First results of the analysis underline that house prices went up all over Europe, but turnover figures (number of sales, volume) started to decline already in the first half of 2022. The development of house prices over the last decade since 2013 differed widely between European countries and much more than the development of economic activity within European countries. Comparing the developments since 2008, it is worth mentioning that GDP recovery following the GFC and the Covid Crisis allowed nearly all countries to reach their pre-crisis level until 2022 before the Ukraine war related effects hit again the European economies from summer 2022. In contrast to the economic developments, housing markets in various European countries did not yet reach the pre-crisis level until 2022 although the upswing of the housing markets started in Europe around 2014 even without being hampered by the Covid crisis. In a small number of European countries house prices doubled between 2008 and 2022. The available data on quarterly house sales (number of transactions and volume) seems to be a promising data source to develop projections of the housing market in many European countries.