November 14, 2007 1:15
House prices on Amsterdam's Herengracht have almost returned to their 1736 highs
I missed this when it came out, but the NRC Handelsblad had a piece Saturday on the latest data from University of Maastricht professor Piet Eichholtz's famous index of house prices along the Herengracht in Amsterdam dating back to 1650 (translation mine):
The average house on the Herengracht now costs 2.6 million euros. That is, on an inflation-adjusted basis, just a bit less than in 1736, when house prices along the Herengracht were at their historical high. If house prices keep rising at their current tempo, the 271-year-old record will be tied in 2008.
Eichholtz's index is a favorite of Yale economist Bob Shiller, who sees it as evidence that real estate prices don't always go up, and can in fact decline for centuries on end. Take a look at the chart, and you can see what he means.
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Justin Fox is TIME's business and economics columnist. This is his blog. About the Authors
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Reader Comments (1)
My ancestors, the Dutch, seem to have been involved in financial innovations hundreds of years ago -- trading securities, bubbles in tulip bulbs and real estate bubble.
Thanks Justin. I had heard of this, but had not seen the chart.
Posted by Kurt Brouwer | November 15, 2007 2:38 PM