Israel's Housing Market Boom: Record-Breaking Inventory Levels

According to the latest data from the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) summarizing 2024, the number of available apartments is rising at an unprecedented pace, reaching figures never seen before.

In December alone, approximately 76,000 apartments were listed—a 7% increase compared to November. Jerusalem was ranked as the leading city in real estate transactions over the past year, while Tel Aviv topped the charts for the highest number of available apartments.

This extraordinary growth is to be credited by a high supply level illustrating the vast number of unsold units in the hands of developers. The annual increase in available inventory stands at about 10%.

This data highlights the increasing financial incentives offered by real estate developers trying to offload their unsold inventory.

Despite these incentives, the rate of new listings is significantly outpacing the volume of sales. This could make 2025 a crucial test year—or even a survival challenge—for many developers. The Bank of Israel's latest stability report revealed that the profitability of publicly traded construction firms plummeted to just 2% last year.

Market trends indicate that after a sharp increase in new apartment purchases between April 2023 and May 2024, demand has started to decline again. Since mid-2024, the sales rate of new apartments has been dropping by an average of 3.8% per month, suggesting that homebuyers are no longer responding to financial incentives as they did previously.

In contrast, purchases of second-hand apartments increased between September and October 2023, followed by a period of market stability in the last quarter of 2024.

Jerusalem claimed the title of Israel’s real estate capital in 2024, with a total of 6,719 property transactions, including 2,948 purchases of new apartments. Following closely was Tel Aviv, where 5,537 transactions were recorded, with 3,267 involving new properties. Be'er Sheva ranked third with 5,028 transactions (1,257 for new apartments), followed by Haifa with 4,992 transactions (1,216 for new homes) and Ashkelon, which saw 3,289 transactions, including 1,517 for newly built units.

Together, these five cities accounted for a quarter of Israel's total residential real estate transactions in 2024.

While Jerusalem was the leader in property sales, Tel Aviv had the highest number of available apartments, with 8,731 new units on the market by the end of 2024. It was followed by Jerusalem (7,309 units), Bat Yam (4,249), Ramat Gan (3,565), and Netanya (3,286).

These five cities alone accounted for 36% of the total available housing inventory in Israel at the end of the year.

This article used Israeli publication Globes's as a data source.