BIS Papers No 21
383
Closing remarks
Paul Van den Bergh
This very interesting and useful conference has confirmed the importance of real estate indicators for
financial and monetary stability. It has also confirmed the importance to improve approaches and
statistical methodologies for the collection, compilation and dissemination of real estate prices. Let me
briefly summarise what I believe has come out of the discussions and what could be the steps ahead.
First, the impetus for this conference came from discussions related to the development of the
Compilation Guide on Financial Soundness Indicators. The Guide includes a chapter with a
preliminary discussion of real estate information and the construction of real estate price indices. As
work on real estate price indices continues and deepens, the issue is how the Compilation Guide can
be refreshed over the years. The Guide could, for instance, spell out a structured approach to collect
real estate statistics and to develop a framework for the family of indices that could serve a variety of
uses.
Second, emerging market countries are asking for guidance and technical assistance to develop real
estate indicators. Consideration may be given as to how such assistance could be provided and the
expertise that would be available. The conference has helped to identify some of the questions that
need to be addressed when embarking on the development of property price indices. It will be useful
to continue to share experiences of different countries in developing such statistics. Two venues
where the discussion could be continued are the Conference of the Irving Fisher Committee on
Central Bank Statistics in Basel in September 2004 and the April 2005 Session of the International
Statistical Institute in Sydney, where FSIs are already on the agenda.
Third, the networking established during the conference will hopefully be useful. The conference has
brought together many stakeholders: users of various sorts with a variety of needs, suppliers of da