In the latest global home price index, India has slipped 13 spots, to rank 56th globally, when it comes to home price appreciation. International property consultancy, Knight Frank, in its ‘Global House Price Index Q4 2020’, cited that India has seen a decline of 3.6% year-on-year (YoY), which led to the slip. Note that for the purposes of research, the consultancy tracks the prices of homes in 56 countries. India, in Q4 2020, therefore, remains the weakest contender among nations.
Top 10 countries in the world to record highest capital appreciation
| Rank | Country/territory | 12-month % change (Q4 2019-Q4 2020) | 6-month % change (Q2 2020-Q4 2020) | 3-month % change (Q3 2020-Q4 2020) |
| 1 | Turkey | 30.3% | 11.0% | 5.5% |
| 2 | New Zealand | 18.6% | 17.0% | 8.1% |
| 3 | Slovakia | 16.0% | 7.0% | 3.4% |
| 4 | Russia | 14.0% | 7.8% | 4.4% |
| 5 | Luxembourg | 13.6% | 7.0% | 2.7% |
| 6 | Poland | 10.9% | 4.1% | 2.1% |
| 7 | United States | 10.4% | 6.6% | 3.3% |
| 8 | Peru | 10.3% | 4.9% | 2.3% |
| 9 | Sweden* | 10.1% | 6.7% | 4.0% |
| 10 | Austria | 10.0% | 5.0% | 1.3% |
| 54 | Morocco | -3.3% | -4.3% | -3.4% |
| 56 | India | -3.6% | -1.4% | -0.8% |
Source: Knight Frank Research
* Provisional | Data for Chinese Mainland refers to primary market | Data for Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Malaysia, Poland, Romania, Slovenia and Taiwan is to Q3 2020; Data for Hungary, Luxembourg and Morocco is to Q2 2020.
Among countries, Turkey is numero uno, recording a 30% Y-o-Y appreciation, leading the index for the fourth consecutive quarter. Turkey is followed by New Zealand, which recorded an increase of 18.6% over the last one year. Slovakia with 16%, Russia with 14% and Luxembourg with 13.6% capital appreciation, are the others in the top five.
See also: COVID-19 impact on global property markets: Why are housing prices rising in the west?
Residential real estate price trends in India
Morocco and India have shown the least price appreciation, at -3.3% and -3.6% Y-o-Y. However, many see this as an opportunity. In the case of India, prospective home buyers have always been hunting for affordable homes. With the Coronavirus pandemic wreaking havoc and with many jobs lost, buyers turned to the government for easing the financial difficulties that many were facing. Corrective measures included historic low home loan interest rates and reduction in stamp duty and other levies on residential purchases in key markets. Developers further added concessions to the governments’ steps, leading to a further reduction in effective prices of homes. These steps have stimulated demand for housing in the latter part of 2020 but have kept prices at bay.
“Low-interest rates and other demand stimulation measures by the government have fuelled real estate demand. This has led to sales and launches in Q4 2020 witnessed a significant jump, compared to the first three quarters of 2020. The pandemic has effectively changed end users’ outlook towards ownership of homes, leading many fence-sitters to make their purchase decisions. As the vaccine rollout takes place, we expect normalcy to return, after which the government will have to devise measures to extend the current sales momentum,” said Shishir Baijal, chairman and managing director, Knight Frank India.
The Global House Price Index Q4 2020 also highlighted that among 56 countries, 89% saw a price increase in 2020 and the average annual change across countries and territories was to the tune of 5.6% in 2020. New Zealand with 19% appreciation, Russia with 14%, the US with 10%, Canada and the UK with 9% appreciation, have recorded accelerated growth in rankings in the last three months, thanks to the growth in housing demand.
In the Asia-Pacific region, however, in spite of the commendable handling of the pandemic, the performance of the housing market remained glum, especially in Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong and Malaysia.
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