I see the Iraqi Prime Minister, Nouri Maliki, is talking about withdrawing immunity from prosecution granted to US and “coalition of the willing” troops who accidentally kill, maim or rape the locals. Anyone taking bets on how quickly the USA will withdraw their troops if that happens?
The Economist has regularly published reports on how property prices are developing in different countries, and it has been very frustrating for us to see that while in the last 25 years, the average price of a house in the UK has increased from £23 000 to £158 000 (a factor of over six times), property prices in Germany have remained stagnant. (If you live in Germany, you might find that a little difficult to believe, but you can download an Excel sheet of UK prices since 1952 from the Nationwide Building Society and check the UK figures yourself). In fact, when we sold an apartment we bought in Munich in 1982 a couple of years ago, we sold it for 20% less than we paid for it. If only we’d kept our money invested in property in the UK, instead of transfering it to Germany…
What I haven’t understood until now was why the German market was performing so abysmally, when the USA, Australia and most European countries have been behaving like the UK market. However, this week the Wirtschaftswoche published an article (WiWo Nr. 27, 2006-07-03: Konjunkturkommentar – Kräftig durchluften) pushing for deregulation of the German property market and things became a little clearer.
What is different between Germany and the rest of those countries where the market has boomed for 25 years or more?
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