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Simeon Mitropolitski is a Canadian analyst, of Bulgarian origin, and a former syndicated columnist with the Bulgarian News Agency (BTA). He is the author of several hundred articles dealing with hot political and economic topics, both national and international.

He was part of the first group of Bulgarian intellectuals and students that began the opposition movement that finally put an end to the communist regime in this country in 1989, and in 1996-1997 participated in international observation teams during the elections in several Balkan countries - Romania, Albania and Bulgaria.

In 2002 Simeon and his family moved from Bulgaria to Canada where they live now in Montreal, province of Quebec. Simeon is a Master of Political Science from McGill University and a B.A. of Political Science and History.

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Many in Europe consider Norway to be a dream country, not by its climate conditions but by its economic basis - higher living standard ($27 000 per capita per year), relatively lower taxes than the other countries in the region, very substantial oil and gas reserves (among the most important in the world), and all this combined with the tradition Scandinavian low criminal rates and higher level of social protection.

Norway was probably the only country in Europe which people so far has rejected twice in referendums the idea of becoming a member of the European Union (1972 and 1994). The principal reason was that Norwegians didn't want to share its natural resourses and living standard with the less advanced countries in Southern Europe. As for the local government, maybe in the next 10 years it will try again to push ahead with the European integration project. As for the majority of the Norwegians I expect that they will certainly confirm again their opposition to the EU.

Helped by the higher oil and gas prices in the last 2 years, Norwegian economy has further improved its positions and the population has found itself with more cash and investment options. According to the local experts, eight out of ten Norwegian kroners ($1 = 8.5 NOK) that have been invested by the population in the recent years have been used for the purchase or improvement of homes and vacation cabins.

Only in 2000 almost 90 000 homes (Norwegian population is 4.5 million) changed hands, which is an increase of 16 percent over 1999. The sales amounted to 128 billion NOK ($15.5 billion), almost 50 percent over the previous year. Norwegians buy more homes but also they buy more expensive homes. The price of the vacation properties has more than doubled in the last 6 years. The average price of a cabin in the mountain or a cottage in the sea coast has increased from 245 000 NOK ($28 800) to 517 000 NOK ($60 800). Taking into account only the holiday homes the sales in the same period almost tripled.

Norwegians have been considered for many decades to be among the richest nations in the world*. So why only now they have started to invest so much on the real estate market? If we look at the local press the answer is simple - in the last 15 years (sufficient period to make assessments) the value of the private homes has risen more than the value of stocks on the Oslo Exchange. This has been stimulated by lowering taxes on private properties in that period. This explains why Norwegians with their almost constant level of population have suddenly started to move into larger and larger (and more expensive) homes in the recent time.

Stock exchange burst which started in the United States in March 2000 and moved toward Europe in the following months, only accelerated the process of putting the investments into more reliable places such as the real estate. Even the additional costs of the transaction process** which came into effect this summer and the higher interests on loans will hardly affect the upward trends of the market, local experts says. So without any major investment alternative for the households we can expect more months and even years ahead of strong real estate market in Norway.

*- In the last edition of "The World Almanac and book of facts" Norway comes on the second place just behind the United States in terms of Gross Domestic Product per capita.

** - From July 1st 2001 Norwegian government introduced 24 percent VAT (sale tax) on all services, including real estate agents'.

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See also the directory of companies providing real estate services in, and general real estate information of Norway.