KEY POINTS:
Annual house price inflation in New Zealand in the last quarter of 2006 was in the bottom half of 20 countries tracked by the Economist magazine.
New Zealand house prices were up 8.8 per cent on a year earlier, well down on the 15.8 per cent rise recorded in the last quarter of 2005.
Australian house price inflation rose to 8.3 per cent in 2006 from 2.3 per cent the year before, in Britain it rose to 10.2 per cent from 2.9 per cent and in the United States, it fell to 5.9 per cent from 13.2 per cent.
From 1997 to 2006, house prices in New Zealand increased by 105 per cent. That compares to 351 per cent in South Africa, 253 per cent in Ireland, 196 per cent in Britain, 173 per cent in Spain, 135 per cent in Australia, and 102 per cent in the US.
Prices fell in Hong Kong by 43 per cent and in Japan by 32 per cent.
The increase in house prices in 2006 eased in 10 of the 20 countries tracked by the magazine.
The rate of rise in the US was the lowest for seven years.
- NZPA
