European Union house prices picked up in the fourth quarter of 2020, reaching the pre-pandemic level, while in Croatia they slowed, but remained above the EU average, according to a Eurostat report released on Thursday.

House prices, as measured by the House Price Index, rose by 5.7% in the EU compared with the fourth quarter of 2019. They rose at the same rate as in the first quarter of 2020, when they had recorded the highest growth in more than 12 years. In the third quarter they increased by 5.3%.

In the euro area, house prices rose by 5.4%, their strongest rise in 14 years. In the third quarter they went up by 4.9%.

The highest annual increases in house prices in the fourth quarter of 2020 were recorded in Luxembourg (+16.7%), Denmark (+9.8%) and Lithuania (+9.4%).

In Croatia, house prices in the last quarter of 2020 rose by 6.4% compared with the same quarter of 2019. They increased by 6.9% in the third quarter and by 8.3% in the second quarter.

Compared with the previous quarter, the highest increases were recorded in Cyprus and Luxembourg (+4.7% each), Lithuania (+3.9%) and Estonia (+3.8%), while decreases were observed only in Spain (-0.8%) and Hungary (-0.7%).

In Croatia, house prices rose by 2.5% compared with the third quarter of 2020, when they had decreased by 0.6%.