Transaction prices for real estate in the primary market in Warsaw rose by 21.6% year-over-year, but in Kraków, they surged by 31.8%. Poznań falls between these two cities, with an annual increase of 22.8%. Kraków also saw the highest increase in listing prices - up by 28.4%. Warsaw was second in this category with a 20.4% increase, and Poznań was third with an 18.3% year-over-year rise.
Overall, transaction prices in the seven largest real estate markets in the second quarter increased by 20.4% year-over-year in the primary market. Listing prices, on the other hand, rose by 18.7% year-over-year. The National Bank of Poland (NBP) provides data for Gdańsk, Gdynia, Kraków, Łódź, Poznań, Warsaw, and Wrocław.
Where are the most expensive apartments?
Kraków is starting to catch up with Warsaw, and although prices rose faster there in the last year (and also in the last quarter, as discussed further), the most expensive properties are still in the capital. The transaction price per square meter in Warsaw reached 16,021 PLN (3200,34 GBP). In Kraków, it’s still almost a thousand PLN less - 15,277 PLN (3051,72 GBP). The third most expensive city is Wrocław, where a square meter costs 13,537 PLN (2704,14 GBP).
However, this is the only category in which Warsaw leads in the last quarter. Kraków again takes the lead when looking at listing prices. In the capital of Małopolska, apartments are offered at an average price of 16,754 PLN (3346,76 GBP) per square meter, while in Warsaw, it’s 16,515 PLN (3299,02 GBP). Once again, Wrocław is third - 13,992 PLN (2795,03 GBP).
Housing prices are rising, although there are cities where listing prices have fallen in the last quarter
Quarter-over-quarter, transaction prices increased by 2.5%, and listing prices by 2.8%. The situation becomes more interesting when we look at specific cities. In two of them, listing prices actually fell in the last quarter: in Poznań by 0.2% and in Gdynia by as much as 4.7%. Unfortunately, this doesn’t have much impact on transaction prices. In Gdynia, the quarterly increase was as high as 9.6%, the highest among the seven largest markets. In Poznań, the increase was 6.3% quarter-over-quarter, making it the second-highest.
The lack of correlation between listing price increases and transaction price increases is also evident in other cities. In Kraków, listing prices increased the most quarter-over-quarter—by 7.5%. However, transaction prices only rose by 4% quarter-over-quarter, which is only the fourth-highest increase after Gdynia, Poznań, and Wrocław (5.4%). In Warsaw, the quarterly increase was relatively small. Listing prices rose by 2%, and transaction prices by 0.2%.
According to NBP data, transaction prices in the secondary market in the second quarter of 2024 increased in Warsaw (2.4% quarter-over-quarter), in the six largest cities excluding Warsaw (4.8% quarter-over-quarter), and in the next 10 largest cities (3.7% quarter-over-quarter). However, in each of these categories, the increase was lower than in the first quarter of 2024. In the primary market, the price dynamics of housing in Warsaw significantly slowed down—after three consecutive quarters of price increases of over 6% quarter-over-quarter, the growth rate dropped to 0.8% quarter-over-quarter in the second quarter of 2024, according to PKO BP.
However, an important caveat was noted by analyst Andrzej Prajsner. NBP calculates prices "based on data provided by real estate agents and developers," covering only part of the transactions. In the primary markets of the six largest cities, this accounted for approximately 50% (in Wrocław) to 90% (in Gdańsk) of all developer sales in the first quarter."
