Canada and Australian property prices outperform US and UK

A new study reveals that house prices in Canada and Australia have outperformed those in the US and UK over the last 10 years.

According to the study carried out by Toronto-based rating agency DBRS, which reviewed 50 major housing markets across Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States over the past decade, Canadian and Australian markets were by far the top performers.

In fact, cities in these two countries occupied the first 12 places in the list. According to the report, growth in the Canadian housing market was primarily driven by increased real disposable income levels and progressively stronger population growth through immigration, while Australia fared well due to its relatively strong economic performance throughout the global financial crisis.

Darwin, the capital of Australia’s Northern Territory, was the best performing city analysed in the ten-year period between 2004 and 2014, with prices said to have risen by an average of 9.6 per cent per year during this period. The city was said to have benefited greatly from both population growth and the booming oil and gas sector. The second best performing market in this period was the Canadian city of Winnipeg, based in Manitoba (8 per cent per year).

The best performing UK market was London, ranked 13th overall with an annual growth rate of 6.1 per cent, while the top performing US market was Portland, Oregon (21st overall with average price increases of just 2.1 per cent per year).

The US housing market was hit particularly hard during the past decade and has yet to fully recover on an aggregate basis from a housing crisis that began in 2006. Las Vegas was the worst performing market, dropping over 60 per cent from top to bottom during the financial crisis.

Article published 17th December 2014