Finance & economics | The great escape

Why house prices are surging once again

In America, Australia and parts of Europe, property markets have shrugged off higher interest rates

Aerial view of a residential city area, with a winding road descending a hillside
Photograph: Getty Images
|San Francisco

Is a fresh housing boom under way? In April a house-price index for the world, excluding China, rose by more than 3% year on year (see chart 1 ). American house prices are 6.5% higher than a year ago, Australian ones have increased by 5% and Portuguese ones are soaring. In other countries, the market looks surprisingly strong given years of high interest rates (see chart 2).

This article appeared in the Finance & economics section of the print edition under the headline “The great escape”

From the June 22nd 2024 edition

Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents

Explore the edition

Discover more

Donald Trump in Brownsville, Texas on November 19th 2024

Trump wastes no time in reigniting trade wars

Canada and Mexico look likely to suffer

Illustration of a large anvil falling down on a government building.

How Trump, Starmer and Macron can avoid a debt crunch

With deficits soaring, their finance ministers will have to be smart


Scott Bessent speaks at the National Conservative Conference in Washington, DC.

What Scott Bessent’s appointment means for the Trump administration

The president-elect’s nominee for treasury secretary faces a gruelling job


What Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders get wrong about credit cards

Forget interest rates. Rewards are the real problem

Computers unleashed economic growth. Will artificial intelligence?

Two years after ChatGPT-3.5 arrived, progress has been slower than expected

Should investors just give up on stocks outside America?

No, but it is getting a lot harder to keep the faith