Prime residential prices are cooling globally, with Hong Kong performing the worst, according to the latest study by Knight Frank.

In a survey of 46 cities worldwide, Hong Kong ranked last with a 14.3 per cent decline in prices in the second quarter compared with the same period last year. On a quarterly basis, the city again took the bottom spot with an 11.7 per cent drop.

Average annual growth in housing prices across the nearly four dozen cities slowed to 2.3 per cent in the June quarter, down from 3.5 per cent in the March quarter and below the long-term average of 5.2 per cent. It was the weakest annual growth since the fourth quarter of 2023.

“Prime markets are taking a collective breath,” said Liam Bailey, global head of research at Knight Frank. “The recovery we have seen over recent quarters was aided by expectations of lower borrowing costs, and with that timeline now pushed out, a cooling in price growth is inevitable.”

“We’re seeing a more fragmented market, with some European cities showing surprising strength while former high-flyers in Asia begin to level off,” he said.

On a quarterly basis, the overall index showed a decline of 0.1 per cent – a significant slowdown from the 1.3 per cent increase recorded in the first quarter.