Spanish home sales up 7%

A rise in home sales in January was the first in three years.

Home sales in Spain rose for the sixth straight month in June, official data showed, a positive sign for the economy which was hit by the collapse of its once-booming property sector in 2008.

Sales rose 7.0 per cent year-on-year in June, slightly less that in May, the National Statistics Institute said.

During the first six months of the year, sales were up 10.7 per cent over the same period in 2009.

The bursting of the property bubble plunged the Spanish economy, Europe's fifth-largest, into its worst recession in decades in 2008 and has sent the unemployment rate soaring to more than 20 percent, the highest in the euro zone.

It emerged during the first quarter of this year with tepid growth of 0.1 per cent, and the Bank of Spain has estimated the economy expanded 0.2 per cent in the second quarter.

The rising housing sales were spurred by lower prices and more attractive interest rates.