On Balance, are Balances a Leading Indicator of Property Market Performance?

This paper explores the time-series relationship between economic and commercial property market performance across the 12 regions of the UK from 1981 to 2004. In particular, it focuses on the role played by regional survey data in providing an indicator of property market performance across the manufacturing and service sectors. Whilst the inclusion of survey data in property forecasting models offers a potentially richer insight to property market performance we investigate the intrinsically more interesting question as to whether business confidence data are a leading indicator of property market performance.