Residential Property Markets in CESEE EU Member States

This paper provides an overview of residential property market developments in ten Central, Eastern and Southeastern European (CESEE) EU Member States over the last 10 to 15 years, featuring price developments, housing conditions, affordability, housing financing and policy measures targeting residential property markets. The descriptive cross-country approach particularly focuses on the period of the economic and financial crisis by capturing the recent boom and bust of residential property prices across the whole region. We observe that high levels of home ownership and low costs of external housing financing were related to rising residential property prices. Besides the small size of the rental market, rising demand for affordable good-quality housing suggests that price developments during the forthcoming catching-up of residential property markets are likely to be dynamic. In this respect, policy action in different areas should increasingly attempt to keep a lid on housing market developments in CESEE.