Madrid, Oct 10 (IANS): Housing sales increased by 3 percent in Spain in August 2011 as compared to the same month of the previous year, marking the first increase after 17 months of decline in a row, the Spanish National Statistics Institute (INE) reported.
This increase is mainly thanks to new houses sales, which climbed by 6.2 percent from August 2011 to August 2012, representing a 50.2 percent of the total registered in August, reported Xinhua citing INE.
The INE Tuesday also noted that from July 2012 to August 2012, housing sales increased by 1.2 percent.
The jump of house sales in August could be affected by the drop of housing prices, in addition to policy incentives.
The Spanish government announced in July that the some tax advantages for house purchasers would expire in 2013, including the Value Added Tax applied to new home purchase which will rise from the current 4 percent to 10 percent.