World's house values fall for the first time

[girl gone mad]

Global house prices fell for the first time on record over the past three months, underlining the extent of the downturn.

Britain, which recorded falls of 4.6% during the quarter, was among the worst performers along with Latvia (6.2% down), Norway (4.5%) and Canada (4.9%), according to the property consultancy Knight Frank. The firm's global house price index said average prices across the world fell by 0.3% compared with the second quarter.

"It is now clear that no part of the world is likely to escape the credit crunch as property prices start to fall in more and more parts of the globe," said Nicholas Barnes, head of international research at Knight Frank.

"We expect that trend to continue with the majority of locations showing zero or negative growth by the end of the year."

On an annualised basis, global house prices continued to grow, though the rate of 3.8% compared with the third quarter last year, has slowed. Over the past year, prices in Britain have suffered the fourth largest percentage decline in the table of 44 nations compiled from official national statistics. Compared with the third quarter in 2007, house prices in Britain have fallen by 10.6%. In Estonia prices have dropped by 16%, in the US prices are down 16.3% and Latvia declined by 24.1%.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/nov/24/international-property-house-prices-dubai

[Warpy]

1. I've been watching some prices in Mexico

going down, some because the peso has fallen against the dollar, others because expats aren't coming down by the thousands any more.

I think it's happening all over.

[Boojatta]

2. The title and first sentence conflate value and price.

You might have made a good investment decision because you purchased high-value securities. However, would a high price justify the conclusion that the value is high?