In the 17 largest cities (provincial cities and Gdynia), housing prices in the last quarter of last year increased by 14% y/y on average, compared to a 9-10% y/y increase in Q3 last year, according to a report by the Polish Economic Institute (Polskiego Instytutu Ekonomicznego – PIE). The highest prices are in Warsaw and Krakow.
According to the report “Analysis of the residential market. Q4 2023′, the two cities with the highest prices – Warsaw and Krakow, saw increases of 21% and 26% on the secondary market and 17% and 27% on the primary market, respectively. The average price per sq.m. of a flat in Warsaw was PLN 17,200 on the secondary market and PLN 15,800 on the primary market, while in Krakow it was PLN 15,500 on the secondary market and PLN 15,100 on the primary market.
“In Kraków, in both markets, the average price per sq.m. increased by more than 25% compared to Q4 2022. Price increases of more than 15% y-o-y are also observed in other large cities. In Warsaw, the increase was 21% in the secondary market and 17% in the primary market,” said senior analyst from PIE’s sustainability team Jędrzej Lubasiński.
On average, flat rental prices in the largest cities increased by 2% y-o-y. In the most expensive city – Warsaw – they increased by 9% y/y. In the capital, it was necessary to pay an average of more than PLN 4,400 to rent a flat in Q4 2023. This is followed by Kraków, Wrocław and Gdańsk, where prices are between PLN 2,900 and PLN 3,000, it was reported.
According to PIE, the number of new rental offers in the seven largest cities in Q4 2023 increased by 21% year-on-year. In Warsaw, supply increased by 36% y-o-y and in Wrocław by 34%. On a quarter-on-quarter basis, the rental market in 17 cities declined by an average of 10%. However, the quarter-on-quarter decrease is seasonal in nature and is due to a significant increase in the supply of flats for rent in Q3 due to the end of the academic year. The largest number of offers of flats for rent traditionally appears in Warsaw, where, on average, more than 2,000 adverts were added per week. In other cities, the number of new offers does not exceed 1 thousand.
“The increase in the supply of flats for rent is due to the launch of flats purchased in 2021 for investment purposes. At that time, we observed high interest in the purchase of flats for rent from both institutional and private investors looking for a safe investment for their capital. At that time, renting a flat was profitable compared to interest rates on bank deposits and 10-year treasury bonds The increasing supply towards the end of the year was the result of new flats coming onto the market from the record year 2021, in which almost 300,000 flats were started,” PIE sustainability team senior analyst Tomasz Mądry concluded.
Source: PIE and ISBnews
