In 5 years, since the beginning of the economic crisis, there has been a Euro 43 bn drop in investments and 320,000 jobs have been lost, totalling 500,000 considering also related sectors. These are the figures released by the observatory of Ance, Italian Association of construction contractors. Also 2012 will experience shrinking investments (-6%), even worse than in 2011 (-5.3%) and the current forecasts (-3.8%). Moreover residential transactions have fallen in 2012 (-19.6%), yet average prices have only slightly decreased. These conditions have saved the real estate bubble from popping, said Ance.