Shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, two years after the dot.com bust and at a time when US interest rates were at a record low, a leader in the Economist magazine argued that only rising house prices in the US and Europe were saving the world from a stiff recession.
Less than a decade later, and despite a humongous property crash that has left everyone swearing “never again”, house prices are doing it again. Only this time it is not a credit-fuelled housing boom in the developed world that is rescuing the global economy. It is property in the developing world.
Prime urban housing in China has doubled in price in three years. In India, tycoon Mukesh Ambani recently moved his family into a $1bn Mumbai home, complete with three helipads.