Continental Europe is seeing steep falls in house prices that could exacerbate the region’s already deep recession, even if the declines are receiving less attention than those in the US or UK markets, according a new indicator compiled by the Financial Times.

FT Europe House Price Index

A measure of house price movements on the continent

House prices in the 16-country eurozone in the final three months of 2008 were 4.8 per cent lower on the year, the FT’s eurozone house price index shows. That was almost as large as the 5.4 per cent drop in the FT’s “Europe” house index, which includes non-eurozone countries and was heavily affected by the steep drop in UK house prices.