Property in Spain is still creating massive interest according to the Spanish property experts, Spanish Hot Properties but the obvious question is why? With the news that the economic crisis buffeting Spain sent the number of bankruptcies soaring by 182% to 2,864 in 2008, 38% of them in the real estate sector, reveals a new report from Pricewaterhouse Coopers. “Between October and December there were more insolvency proceedings than in all of 2007,” says the report, which warns that the commercial courts could collapse under the workload if this trend continues in 2009. Bankruptcies amongst developers and brokers rose from 74 in 2007 to 387 in 2008, and in the construction sector from 182 to 692. The rapidly rising number of property companies being forced into administration, like Martinsa-Fadesa, is likely to have a significant impact on the market There is even more bad news in the form The number of Spanish properties bought and sold in October (39,201) was 27.5% less than the same time last year, according to the latest figures from the Spain’s National Institute of Statistics (INE). In the first 10 months of the year, sales are down by 28.4% compared to last year. That means that the Spanish property market has shrunk by almost 30% in a year. Figures also released by the INE reveal that new mortgage lending fell by 40.7% in the same period, which helps to explain the severe market contraction. Mortgage lending in Spain, as elsewhere, has been brought to heel by the credit crunch. Finally the news that Last year was the worst year ever on record for the Spanish property sector, and this year, reports the Spanish daily ‘El Pais’. Residential property sales collapsed, as did housing starts, and now there is hard evidence of unprecedented price falls, with new build prices falling 6.6%, according to Sociedad de Tasación, one of Spain’s leading appraisal companies. The price falls recorded by Sociedad de Tasación are the biggest in the two decades that the company has been publishing price statistics. And according to Pedro Pérez, general secretary of the G-14 group of Spain’s biggest developers, prices are going to continue falling. This is a novel development, as developer associations like the G-14 have taken a hard line against price falls ever since the Spanish property market started to wobble. At first they insisted that new build property prices would never go down, then, from one day to the next that prices had already fallen by 15% to 20%, and so did not need to fall further. However such pessimistic news doesn’t seem to deter overseas property buyers from expressing interest in buying property in Spain.
As Spanish Hot Properties Managing Director explains “We are getting over 10 new registrations a day with investors and property buyers alike looking for a deal or a bargain with our Spanish bank property repossessions page getting a huge number of hits and accounting for 50% of all our new enquires. You would think with all the bad news around there just be no interest at all but that is certainly not the case and maybe these people in Northern Europe have just had enough is enough and now is the time to move to Spain. Like most places at the moment there are fantastic opportunities for cash buyers and some are now starting to take advantage of the offers available. My personal view is if the Euro goes back to €1.20 to the pound then a lot more buyers from the UK will move in as the exchange rate had killed any value for them before that date. However Irish buyers don’t have that problem and they are coming over in quite large numbers at the present time”.
So going into 2009 property buyers looking for Costa del Sol property, Homes in Costa Blanca North and Mallorca property should who are in a position to buy should really be able to take advantage of the doom and gloom current effecting the Spanish property market.
To find out more about the Spanish property market in 2009 contact the Spanish property experts Spanish Hot Properties.
HQ Mailing Address:
Spanish Hot Properties SL
Gerald Brennan 46
Alhaurin El Grande 29120
Malaga
Espana
CONTACT VIA TELEPHONE
UK: 0207 558 8355
International: 0034 664 268 809
