In the UK we all know how much our homes are worth and a large industry has grown up that tracks national, regional, local and even street-by-street prices.

But overseas the picture is very different. Except Australia, New Zealand, Cyprus and the US, which have up-to-date land registry systems like ours – and Spain, which has recently modernised and put its online – British owners of property overseas often have little idea which way prices are swinging.

France relies entirely on estate agents to provide this information, Greece has only recently emerged from the stone age house price wise, and in Portugal and Italy the systems are, at best, obscure.

But our latest figures for holiday homes overseas, produced by our sister site FindaProperty.com and featured in this weekend’s Sunday Times, give a snapshot of which way asking prices are rising or falling across the globe.

These figures give an interesting insight into how the global recession has affected property prices in sunnier climes. The biggest dips have been witnessed in Florida, which despite enjoying a brighter 12 months following an easing in the US recession, has nevertheless seen its property prices dip by 29% since 2008.

At No.2 is Cyprus, where prices have dropped by 27% since 2008 and continue to fall as the island’s banks and property market struggle to cope with a dramatic reduction in demand for both its mortgages and homes.

And at No.3 in the price drop league is France, where prices are now 22% lower than they were two years ago, followed by Bulgaria at 20% and Italy at 16%. Spain, whose downturn in asking prices began a year or more earlier than all the other markets has witnessed asking prices drop by a more modest 15% since 2008.

But it’s not all drops. Some countries where British buyers like to own homes have not witnessed such dramatic reductions and in some markets prices are up, not down.

Portugal has seen asking prices recover recently (+1.5% compared to 2008) and Turkey - which is outside the Eurozone and its faltering currency – has seen holiday home prices increase by 7%, the FindaProperty figures show.

In Canada, which is more of an emigration rather than holiday home hotspot, prices have risen by 10% and both New Zealand and Australia have endured only modest losses during the worst of the global downturn.

Vote in our poll on the state of the international property market:

This entry was posted on Monday, July 19th, 2010 at 11:15 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.