Dutch increasingly overbid on overheating housing market

Over a quarter of homes sold in the second quarter of this year, were sold for or above the asking price, according to a study by Calcasa. This combined with skyrocketing housing prices, and an increase in house sales, indicates that the housing market in the Netherlands is overheating, the company, which is focused on automated valuation and statistical analysis of real estate, concluded, NU.nl reports.

In the second quarter of this year, 28 percent of homes were sold on or above asking price. During the previous housing market peak before the credit crisis - around 2007-2008 - only 9 percent of homes were overbid on, according to Calcasa.

This time around, the overbidding is also much more widely spread. Ten years ago, it was mostly homes in Amsterdam and Utrecht that were overbid on. In the second quarter of 2017, overbidding was still most common in these two cities. In Amsterdam 79 percent of sold homes were sold on or above asking price, and 65 percent in Utrecht.

But other cities also saw overbidding on over half of their housing sales. These include Groningen (64 percent), Haarlem (63 percent), Amstelveen (62 percent), Almere (62 percent), Zaanstad (58 percent), Amersfoort (52 percent) and Leiden (51 percent).

Earlier this month Rabobank also noted the overbidding trend. According to the bank, this indicates that there is an increasing risk of a bubble forming on the Dutch housing market.