On Saturday, July 23rd thousands of protestors gathered around in Tel Aviv in order to protest against the soaring housing prices in recent years; the prices of housing rose very sharply not only in the central cities such as Tel Aviv, but also in peripheral cities such as Beer Sheva ... Read More

The Central Bureau of Statistics of Israel published the prices of the Israeli dwelling of the first quarter of 2011.   According to the report, the average apartment prices stood at 1,047 thousand NIS in the first quarter of 2011, a 5.2% decrease compared to Q42010. This was the first drop in ... Read More

Does the real estate sector in Israel slowing down? According to a recent publication by the State Revenue Administration, there was a drop of 12% in number of transactions during the first quarter 2011 compared with the first quarter 2010. The sector that led this fall was the investors' sector with ... Read More

The Bank of Israel has reported to raise the June 2011 Israeli basic interest rate by 0.25 percent points to 3.25%. The main reason Bank of Israel raised its basic interest rate is due to the rising Israeli inflation: During April 2011 the CPI rose by 0.6%. Another reason is Bank of ... Read More

The real estate sector in Israel continues to occupy the news and the Israeli Parliament: it was reported yesterday that an agreement was reached between the Minister of Finance –Yuval Steinitz and Minister of Housing – Ariel Atias; in it, young couples, who are planning to purchase their first apartment ... Read More

Following the recent raises in the basic interest rate in Israel and the new limitation on taking mortgagees, the Governor of Bank of Israel Professor Stanley Fischer called the CEOs of the commercial banks to discuss whether or not the banks are taking the necessary precautions and correctly measuring the ... Read More

Moody's left Israel's credit rating unchanged as it called Israel's economy "resilient and dynamic". The credit rating Moody's reported last week on its economic analysis of Israel and announced that the Israeli economy remains strong and as such left its credit rating at A1. Nonetheless at the same token, Moody's voiced ... Read More

The Bank of Israel decided to fight the increasing inflation mainly in the real estate sector by extending the limitations on mortgages. The recent decision made by Stanly Fisher – chairman of the Bank of Israel was to limit the prime interest based mortgages taken by the public to 40% ... Read More

In the recent Central Bureau of Statistics the Israeli inflation (CPI) increased by 0.2% on a monthly scale during March 2011 (see chart below). During the first quarter of 2011 the Israeli inflation rose by 0.7%. The main sectors that contributed to the rising inflation during March were:  housing (0.5% increase), food ... Read More

Thinking of taking a mortgage to buy a house in Israel? Think again, because Stanly Fisher, the chairman of Bank of Israel, remains determined to fight the rising real estate prices in Israel. After Bank of Israel raised the basic interest rate for three times during 2011, the Central Bank is ... Read More