In comparison, the average increase among euro area countries was 0.9% during the same period, STATEC said last week.

Indeed, Luxembourg apartment prices have more than recovered from the global economic downturn. The cost dropped 2.7% between 2008 and 2009, but then increased four percent between 2010 and 2011.

Last year, the average apartment was sold for 310,000 euro. However, a relatively new gap in prices between new and old buildings emerged late in 2011.

For much of 2009, 2010 and 2011, new apartment prices remained more or less stable, STATEC noted. However starting in the fourth quarter of 2011, new apartment prices gained 5.3% over the previous quarter.

However the Grand Duchy did not experience the fastest housing inflation in the Europe. Between 2008 and the third quarter of 2011, Norway, Finland, Sweden, Belgium and France all saw higher apartment prices, according to Eurostat figures. During the same period, Ireland, Spain, Denmark, the Netherlands and Iceland saw the biggest declines in prices.

More on Luxembourg’s real estate market can be found in the April print edition of Delano, which comes out tomorrow.