(RTTNews) - The average selling price of houses in Australia was down 1.8 percent in the third quarter of 2008, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said on Monday, compared to the second quarter.

That was sharply higher than analyst expectations of a decline of 0.5 percent, and it was also worse than the 0.3 percent quarterly fall in Q2.

On an annualized basis, house prices were up 2.8 percent in the third quarter. That came in below forecasts for a 4.0 percent increase, and it was well below the 8.2 percent jump in the previous quarter.

The largest quarterly increase belonged to houses in Hobart City, up 0.7 percent, while the largest decline was Sydney’s fall of 1.8 percent.

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Posted in Categories: Australia, Economy, Releases.

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