The interviews for the Italian Housing Market Survey were carried out between 23 June 2015 and 14 July 2015. A total of 1,343 estate agents took part. Information was provided on house sales, rentals and prices in the reference quarter (April–June 2015) and on future prospects.
Main Findings
House Prices
In the second quarter of 2015, the negative balance between the proportion of estate agents reporting a fall in selling prices decreased to 56.4 percentage points from 59.3 points in the April survey, while the share reporting an increase was negligible (0.8 per cent). The proportion reporting stable prices rose to 42.7 from 39.4 per cent. This trend was more pronounced in Italy’s North-West, in the South and Islands as well as in metropolitan areas. For the latter, the balance narrowed from -56.4 to -51.4 percentage points.
Sales
The proportion of estate agents that sold at least one property in the second quarter increased slightly to 71.1 per cent (up from 69.6 per cent), which is slightly higher than the figure for the same quarter in 2014 (68.1 per cent). There was, however, a deterioration in the assessments of demand: the balance between respondents reporting an increase in potential buyers and those indicating a decrease slid into negative territory (-4.3 percentage points, down from 5.5 in the April survey). This could be due to seasonal effects: compared with the same period in the previous year, the balance displays a marked improvement (it stood at -20.5 percentage points in 2014).
Mandates to Sell
The balance between responses indicating an increase and a decrease in the stock of mandates fell to 17.2 percentage points, down from 21.1 points in the first quarter, possibly as a consequence of a narrowing in the balance of new mandates (still positive at 12.3 percentage points, but down from 17.9). Estate agents were of the opinion that the main cause of the loss of mandates continued to be the significant gap between the asking price and the offer price. The lack of offers because the asking price was too high was mentioned by 57.9 of respondents (down from 58.5 in the previous survey), while 56.6 per cent gave the reason that sellers found the offer prices too low (down from 58.2 per cent). The proportion of estate agencies that attributed the non-renewal of mandates to the difficulty of obtaining a mortgage appears to have stabilized after declining for two years (the figure is now 29.5 per cent, down from 30.9 in the previous quarter, but it was over 50 per cent in the first quarter of 2013).
Negotiations and selling times
The average discount on sellers’ initial asking price was 15.5 per cent (compared with 15.0 per cent in April). The average time between the start of a mandate and the sale of the property decreased slightly to 9.4 months, down from 9.8 months. Selling times tend to be shorter in urban and metropolitan areas (respectively, 8.3 and 8.1 months).
Financing house purchases
The proportion of house purchases financed by a mortgage continued to increase, rising to 66.8 per cent from 65.2 per cent in January. The loan-to-value ratio also went up to 65.3 per cent from 64.2 per cent, largely as a result of increases in the Centre and in the South and Islands bringing them back into line with the national average.
Rentals
The percentage of estate agents that reported renting out at least one property in the second quarter of 2015 rose to 82.7 per cent from 80.0 per cent. In the same period, there was a decline in the share that reported a fall in rents, from 44.8 per cent in the April survey to 38.6 per cent, while those declaring that rents were stable increased from 52.1 per cent to 58.3 per cent. The share of agents expecting rents to stay unchanged in the current quarter is 75.6 per cent, while the proportion forecasting a decrease is 22.3 per cent. These figures are approximately the same as in the previous survey. The average discount on rental prices in relation to the initial asking prices also remained stable (at 6.7 per cent). The balance between replies indicating an increase and those indicating a decrease in new mandates to let came to -6.2 percentage points up from -7.1 in the previous survey; new mandates were reported to be stable by 62.6 per cent of agents compared with 64.1 per cent in April.
Outlook for the agents’ own markets
Estate agents’ assessments of the short-term outlook for their own reference market were less optimistic than in the previous survey, reflecting the seasonal effects that typically influence responses in relation to the summer months; the assessments were, however, more favourable than in the same period a year earlier. The balance between positive and negative assessments for the current quarter was -16.9 percentage points, up from -26.9 in the July 2014 survey. The upswing in the balance did not point to any significant difference between urban areas and the rest of the country or between different areas of the country, with the exception of the South and Islands, where the pick-up was more moderate. In line with this trend, the balance of expectations for new mandates to sell were more pessimistic than in April, falling to 4.3 percentage points from 14.5 points, returning to the levels recorded in the second quarter of 2014. The share of agents expecting prices to fall in the current quarter rose to 47.5 per cent, up from 42.0 per cent in the April survey; some 52.1 per cent expect prices to hold stable.
Outlook for the national housing market
The balance of opinions regarding the short-term outlook for the national market worsened compared with he previous survey owing to seasonal factors, but it improved in relation to the same period in 2014, going from -34.3 percentage points one year ago to -19.9 points in the current quarter; the improvement was more marked in the North-East and in non-urban areas. Expectations for the medium term (two years) are moderately optimistic, although less so thanin the previous survey: the share of agents forecasting an improvement edged down to 43.1 per cent from 50.6 per cent in April, while the share expecting a deterioration rose from 16.2 to 20.9 per cent. Compared with the second quarter of 2014, estate agents’ expectations show a significant improvement.
