New home sales up 58% in 2019

New homes in Harish Photo: Shlomi Yosef
New homes in Harish Photo: Shlomi Yosef

New homes sales in the first nine months of 2019 rose 58% over the corresponding period of 2018, the Central Bureau of Statistics reports.

Deals in the Buyer Fixed Price Plan are starting to gain ground and the number of new housing units purchased in the first three quarters of 2019 is 58% more than the number purchased in the first three quarters of 2018 and 16% more than in the first three quarters of 2017, according to figures published by the Central Bureau of Statistics.

The leading city new homes purchased in the third quarter of 2019 was Harish, followed by Jerusalem, Ramat Gan, and Tel Aviv.

7,440 new homes were purchased in the third quarter of 2019, down 2.7%, compared with the preceding quarter, but a 2.7% increase in seasonally adjusted figures. The number of new homes sold in comparison with the preceding month has risen by a monthly average of 2.4% since April 2018.

At the same time, there is a major difference between the months in the third quarter of 2019. 2,730 new homes were sold in July, making it one of the months with the most new homes sales in recent years, while 2,088 homes were sold in September. This is more than in September 2018 and September 2017. In contrast to the past two years, however, the Jewish holidays this year fell at the end of September, indicating that there was another explanation for lower sales in September, and that a drop in sales in October is very likely.

As has been the case all year, the reason for the increase in new home purchases is the Buyer Fixed Price Plan, in which the lotteries were held for new apartments one or two years ago, and the homes have now reached the stages of construction and signing contracts with the lottery winners. 407 new homes were sold in Harish in September, 364 in Jerusalem, 317 in Ramat Gan, and 288 in Tel Aviv.

Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on November 14, 2019

© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2019

New homes in Harish Photo: Shlomi Yosef
New homes in Harish Photo: Shlomi Yosef
Twitter Facebook Linkedin RSS Newsletters גלובס Israel Business Conference 2018