Real old : slight price rise in October

The year 2009 is expected to record a total average decrease in prices compared to 2008, nearly 5%, according to the National Federation of the housing (Photo Paul Delort / Le Figaro)
They rose 0.6% compared to September but the year 2009, prices will show a mean of 5% over 2008, according to the National Federation of the estate.

The price of older housing rose 0.6% in October compared to September, marking a slight recovery on the rise, according to a study released Wednesday by the National Federation of Real Estate (Fnaim). The increase is slightly higher for homes (+0.9%) and apartments (0.4%). However, "the year 2009 is expected to record a total average decrease in prices compared to 2008, about 5%," says the Fnaim, which evaluated so far down between 7% and 8% after speaking of a fall of 10% earlier this year. The price decline for 2009, lower than expected due to a "movement to stabilize prices in the short term," said the federation would be the second in a row after that of 2008 (-3.1% compared to 2007).

This decrease is combined with the collapse in the number of transactions on existing homes - 500,000 in 2009, a drop of 30% over the previous year - which could be extended if prices kept falling. The downturn in the market was reached after a decade of price increases continuously. Prices had increased by 14% in 2003, 15.5% in 2004, 10.9% in 2005, 7.2% in 2006 and 3.6% in 2007.

On a year (last twelve months compared to twelve months) at the end of October 2009, prices show a decline of 7.1%, against -7.8% at the end of the third quarter. But for the three months studied from August to October 2009 compared to the previous three months, the price decline is only 0.8% (-0.3% for apartments and -1.2% for houses ).