The state of the real estate market in Serbia at present?

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The real estate market has good news and bad news. Stabilization has been imminent for some time, and now we are also seeing a new drop in square meter prices. True, not in all neighborhoods and places, but the fact is that we now have a situation that we did not see in Serbia a few years ago.

The good news is that for several months now we have seen a decrease in the price of square meters, but the bad news is that we now have an increase in prices in areas where the price per square meter decreased in the previous months. The decrease in house prices is noticeable in New Belgrade, Palilula, as well as in some neighborhoods of New Garden. All this is shown by the official data of the portal nekretnine.rs, the latest for May. In a nutshell, prices for square meters have decreased in several districts of Serbia, and this trend was no exception in Belgrade.

Palilula recorded the biggest decrease of 7.7%, and now the average price for May is 2,300 euros per square meter, which is the lowest price for this district since the beginning of the year. For comparison, in February, the average price in this area was 2,963 euros per square meter. A price decrease of 2.27% was also registered in Novi Beograd, resulting in an average price of 2,707 euros per square meter, which is 70 euros less than in April.

In Vojdovac, the average price in May was 2,469 euros per square meter, slightly higher by 0.28% compared to April. The most attractive urban areas, Center and Vrachar, are seeing price increases. The average price per square meter in the center is 3,388 euros with an increase of 1.19%, while Vrachar has an average price of 3,260 euros with a slight increase of 0.31%. It should be noted that in April, these central neighborhoods registered a price decrease of about 2%.

In Novy Sad, a decrease in the price per square meter was also noticed in two locations.

In Niš, property prices at the Pantelej location remained at the same level as in April, amounting to 1,547 euros per square meter. After two months of falling prices, Palilula marks an increase of 5.26% and reaches the highest price per square meter in this location since the beginning of the year, which is 1,523 euros. Price growth is also noted in the location Durlan, and amounts to 1.51%, with a price of 1,345 euros per square meter. The most expensive location in Niš - Bulevar Nemanjića, despite a 2.50% decrease in price, has a price of 1,753 euros per square meter.

The real estate market will calm down

NadвЂorђeviћ, Chairman of the Board of the Real Estate Cluster Association, recently told Blic Biznis that in the first quarter of this year compared to the same period last year, the real estate market recorded a 2.6% increase in turnover in monetary terms, while the number of transactions decreased by 9.5% due to price increases. He added that price increases will be slight, but real estate prices will not decline.

"Due to the high demand that has been in place since mid-2020, which prevents the real estate market from returning to the state of 2017-2018, real estate prices will not decrease. Demand in the real estate market is strong despite less credit being used to finance real estate purchases in the first quarter of 2023," says the interlocutor.

He explains that in developed European economies and in the US, more than 80% of real estate market transactions are financed by loans, so lower economic activity, higher unemployment and uncertainty caused by war usually result in lower real estate market transactions. He notes that we do not have that situation.