The real estate market is already acutely feeling the effects of rate hikes and the cost of financing. In September, home purchase operations fell by 23.7%, the largest percentage since July 2020, to 44,086, according to INE data. It is a sign of the slowdown in this activity, but also, in the opinion of real estate portals, a logical behavior after a particularly dynamic 2022.
With the new drop, sales have been falling for eight months in year-on-year terms, making this September the most anemic in three years. If compared with the previous month, the drop is 10.5%, and if we take the first nine months of the year, the decrease is 8.5% compared to the same period in 2022.
Second-hand home purchase operations, which are equivalent to 81% of the total, have been the most affected, with decreases of 24%, while in the case of new ones the setback has been 19 %. Overall, the INE charts show a market that starts to fall in December and that, except for January, has not stopped going down.
Real estate portals welcomed the new setback yesterday without drama. "The volume of declines is also caused by the staggered effect of comparing with a year of so much activity like 2022", they claim from Idealista, while from Fotocasa they deny the "stop" of the market and they prefer to use the term "accommodation".
Pisos.com considers that the forecasts for the year are being met, except for prices, "which continue with an upward trend", a circumstance that could change in the first quarter of 2024. "The evolution of interest rates "interest and the housing policies carried out by the government of Pedro Sánchez will be key", he points out.
The latest data from the Bank of Spain show that in September mortgages were signed for 4,231 million euros, an amount 22% lower than the 5,435 million euros average over the course of last year. "The contracting trend of activity and credit in the housing market that began in the third quarter of 2022 has continued during the past part of 2023", indicates the institution in its autumn financial stability report, in which no fails to highlight one of the elements that most surprises the market: more purchases are being signed without mortgages than with mortgages.
The INE calculates, in this case with data from August, that the number of mortgages has decreased by 22% compared to the same month of the previous year. Its average amount is also falling, by 4.6%, and is now 138,171 euros.
By autonomous communities, where the drop in home sales is most appreciated is in the Canary Islands, with a drop of 40% in September compared to the same month of the previous year. In Catalonia, the drop was 28.8%, while in Madrid the drop was 23.8%.
The decision of the European Central Bank (ECB) to maintain interest rates for at least two quarters is helping to contain the Euribor, which yesterday marked for the first time since June a daily rate of less than 4%, from a 3.99% In monthly terms, it is above 4% since May.
