Pascal Boulanger, president of the Federation of Real Estate Developers, notes a drop in activity of around 30% in the 2nd quarter compared to last year.
franceinfo: The European Central Bank is once again raising its key interest rates by a quarter of a point. Do you fear a new negative impact on the sector?
Pascal Boulanger: Unfortunately we are no longer close to a negative impact. But yes, indeed, this is not yet good news, even if we expected it. One more rate point means 10% fewer customers. So a quarter of a point is still 2.5% fewer customers.
Today, you publish alarming figures for new housing. Building permits are in free fall in the second quarter: -27% for building permits, -38% for new housing sales.
There is a supply and demand crisis. When we talk about building authorization, these are building permits and sales. We put a lot fewer products on sale because we have a lot fewer building permits. I have deplored this since the last municipal elections.
But also, as we sell less, we do not put other products on sale. We wait until we have already sold what we have to market, rather than putting out other products.
“There are two phenomena: mayors are giving fewer building permits and we are careful not to engage in self-competition with products that do not sell.”
Pascal Boulangerat franceinfo
Do you think customers are waiting for prices to drop? Are they in a wait-and-see attitude?
Unfortunately, prices will not go down. The price of new housing reflects a combination of technical things: the price of land, construction costs, architect’s fees, project manager’s fees, and so on. The former is a market price. New is a technical price, so it can’t really go down. If it goes down, it will be marginal. So today, there is a wait-and-see attitude because there is a lack of confidence. And there may also be a wait-and-see approach to a possible drop in interest rates.
In a recent newspaper interview The world, the boss of Nexity, Véronique Bédague, is calling for a review of rental taxation. While we see that the elimination of the Pinel niche is included in the finance bill. Do you agree with her?
I’m not sure that Pinel is a niche, but maybe we don’t have time to talk about that. I completely agree. I sometimes talk with Véronique. It is more interesting today to rent in Airbnb than in a main residence. So at least everything should be aligned.