The price growth index for apartments and housing in Russia has been twice as high as in Europe in recent years.

The residential real estate market continues to show signs of activity. In the first quarter of this year, while real estate prices in the eurozone decreased by 0.9% compared to the last quarter of 2022, in Portugal they increased by an average of 1.4%. According to data released by Eurostat, Portugal ranked sixth among the 20 eurozone countries in terms of residential real estate price growth from January to March this year.

"We continue to face a chronic housing shortage, now further exacerbated by rising construction costs," Ricardo Guimarães, director of Confidential Real Estate, said in May in response to the results of the Portuguese Housing Market Survey (PHMS), which indicated an expectation by real estate developers and intermediaries that there would be no decline in prices over the next 12 months.

At the same time, Luxembourg and Germany posted property price declines of 4.5% and 3.1% respectively in the first quarter of 2023, leading a group of eight eurozone countries where house prices fell in the first quarter of this year.

The greater activity in the residential real estate market in Portugal compared to European countries is not a new trend and is not short-lived. For example, Eurostat data shows that in the last 12 months ending in March, while real estate prices in Portugal rose by an average of 8.7%, there was a slight increase in the eurozone (0.4%). The same trend was seen in 2022 (Portugal: 11.3% vs. eurozone: 3%), as well as over the last two and five years, with prices in Portugal rising twice as fast as the eurozone average. For example, over the last five years, while real estate prices in Portugal have risen by an average of 10.2% per year, resulting in an overall increase of 58%, prices in the eurozone have risen by an average of 5.1% per year, resulting in an overall increase of 28%.

Rents are closely related to real estate prices. The dynamics of the national real estate market is not limited only to real estate sales and purchases. It also extends to the rental market.

Although both rents and real estate prices in Portugal are rising faster than the eurozone average, as of 2018, the sale and purchase market has much more strength than the rental market. According to Eurostat data, real estate sale prices in Portugal have risen almost four times faster than rents over the past five years. Although this seems great, especially because only five countries in the eurozone have a ratio higher than Portugal's, this value is very close to the eurozone average (3.5 times). This trend even changed slightly in the first quarter, when rents rose (1.6%) slightly faster than real estate prices (1.4%). "The rental market continues to show strong demand, which, combined with a lack of supply, is putting pressure on rents," said the latest PHMS report by Confidencial Imobiliário.