Over the past 12 months, house prices have risen by 7.3 percent.

The average price of a home in Norway was NOK 4,712,860 at the end of January.

- House prices rose by 4.4 percent in January, which gave a strong seasonally adjusted increase of 1.4 percent. This is more than Eiendom Norge's forecast for January of 3.5 percent. Only in 2022 have we had a stronger increase in house prices in a January month, and it was the central East Norway, Agder, Rogaland and Tromsø that had a particularly strong increase in January, says CEO Henning Lauridsen of Eiendom Norge.

- We attribute the strong development to several factors that interact. There is currently somewhat less uncertainty about the household economy going forward. Norges Bank has rarely been so clear in its communication about an interest rate cut in March, and we have had real wage growth and will probably also have it this year. In addition, we have received moderate relief in the lending regulations. But perhaps the most important thing is that housing construction will be very low going forward. It is only now that the housing crisis is here with a historically very low supply of newly built homes to the market, he says.

Record volumes in January

In January, 8,528 homes were sold in Norway, which is 25.6 percent more than in the corresponding month in 2024.

In January, 7,498 homes were put up for sale in Norway, which is 26.9 percent more than in the same month in 2024.

- Never before in the history of house price statistics have as many homes been sold and put up for sale as in January. This may indicate a pent-up need to move in the housing market after two years of somewhat lower activity in both the used and new housing markets, says Lauridsen.

It took an average of 69 days to sell a home in January, down from 73 days in December.

Bergen had the shortest sales time with 31 days. Tromsø had the longest sales period with 121 days.

Strongest in Asker and Bærum and weakest in Bodø/m Fauske

The strongest seasonally adjusted price development in January was in Asker and Bærum with a seasonally adjusted increase of 2.3 percent.

The weakest seasonally adjusted price development in January was in Bodø/ Fauske with a decrease of 0.5 percent.

- There are large differences in housing price development both in January and in the longer trend. On the weaker scale, it is Bodø/m Fauske, Drammen and Trondheim that stand out. In January, it is Stavanger, Kristiansand, Bergen, Ålesund and Oslo and Akershus that stand out with strong growth, says Lauridsen.

The government must take the housing crisis seriously

Yesterday, Norway received several new ministers in the wake of the Centre Party leaving the government.

- The housing crisis, which we have long warned about due to the failure of new home sales and housing construction, is now coming. Low housing construction in the future will create even greater pressure in the rental and owner-occupation market. We expect the government to now take the challenges in the housing market more seriously than the ministers from the Centre Party did, especially in the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Local Government and Regional Development, says Lauridsen.

- We are particularly excited about what Finance Minister Jens Stoltenberg (Labour Party) manages to achieve. He will get the housing crisis under control as a cyclical management measure and as something that will weaken the Norwegian economy going forward. He will also push the government's recently proposed proposal for amendments to the Real Estate Brokerage Act through the Storting. This act contains both rules that will ensure safe and efficient housing trade, financial stability and actually also security policy through the industry's control tasks related to money laundering and economic crime, he says.

- As a social economist, we also expect Stoltenberg to look at the Ministry of Finance's model framework. The Ministry of Finance, together with Statistics Norway and Norges Bank, underestimated for a long time how large the fall in housing investments has been and will probably be in 2025. We need better models to be able to make better decisions, concludes Lauridsen.