Further signs of recovery in Spanish property market

The Spanish housing market continues to show signs of recovery with the latest national figures revealing that completed sales in April were significantly higher than last year.

There were 31,505 residential property sales recorded in the property register in April (not counting subsidised housing), up 31% up on the same month last year, according to data from the National Institute of Statistics (INE).

Spanish property transactions in the first four months of the year rose by 15% compared with the same period last year, and by almost a quarter compared with the first four months in 2014, which shows that the market is “now clearly two years into a market recovery in sales”, according to Mark Stucklin, who runs the independent advisory SpanishPropertyInsight.com.

“Compared to 2012 – the year the Spanish property market bottomed out in volume terms – sales were 65% higher,” he said. 

Regions popular with foreign buyers are performing particularly well, with year-to-date (first four months of the year) sales in the Balearics up 30% year-on-year.

“I suspect this is due to resurgence in German demand in both Mallorca and Ibiza, where professionals on the ground tell me that German demand is significantly up,” added Stucklin. 

Other notable increases were 28% in Valencia, 18% in Madrid, and 15% in Barcelona.

In Malaga (home to the Costa del Sol) and Alicante (home to the Costa Blanca), both areas where British buyers traditionally dominate, sales increases were well below the national average.

“This might have something to do with British buyers waiting to see what happens in the Brexit referendum of 23rd June.”