STOCKHOLM: Swedish home prices rose 3.4 percent month on month in seasonally strong January, after four months with falling prices, the Nasdaq OMX Valueguard-KTH Housing Index (HOX) showed on Wednesday.
On an annual basis, they were however down 2.2 %, with apartment prices down 6.1 % and single-family home prices up 0.3 %.
Property prices in the country have boomed over the past two decades, leaving households among Europe’s most indebted. Authorities, the European Commission and the International Monetary Fund have warned debt levels are a serious threat to the Swedish economy.
However, prices fell in the last few months of 2017 amid a surge in building and tougher mortgage rules.
The HOX index is based on a statistical model that compensates for different types of homes sold during various periods to give a better picture of underlying price trends.
Source: Reuters