Archives for September 2008
September 16th, 2008
While I was summarising the new house price data from the Ministry of Housing, I noticed a fairly strong correlation between the top-selling towns in Spain and those recognised as being the most transparent in their dealings with the public. Coincidence? Of course there isn't a 100% tally between the ...
Continue reading Spanish Property News Review
September 16th, 2008
The town hall of Bilbao is the most transparent in Spain in terms of its dealings with the public, the contracting services and its finances according to a study on the transparency of town halls (ITA) by an international organization called International Transparency. This organization used 80 indicators to analyze ...
Continue reading Transparency in Spain's Town Halls
September 15th, 2008
Not only are Spain's economic woes a more extreme version of what's happened in the past year in the U.S. and U.K., they're likely to last longer because of the shallow roots of Spain's recent economic success. A strong rebound isn't out the question, if the government undertakes key reforms, ...
Continue reading More Pain to Come But Spain Should Recover
September 12th, 2008
Lack of clarity on Spanish property valuations, as seen with Aisa (Actuaciones Actividades e Inversiones Inmobiliarias), will continue to be problematic until next year, market experts told dealReporter. Experts surveyed by this news service said that in 2009, vulture funds and other bargain-hunters will begin to buy assets from administrators, ...
Continue reading Problematic Spanish Property Valuations
September 11th, 2008
The Spanish Ministry of Housing recently revised their house price data for Q4 2007 and provided provisional data for Q1 2008. It makes you wonder what they've been doing for the past 5 months or so doesn't it? You can download sanitised versions of the MVIV data for: Average price paid Number ...
Continue reading Q1 2008 Spanish Housing Ministry Figures Released
September 11th, 2008
Owners of Spanish property could lose their homes if they fail to produce new identification documents proving their non-resident status. Britons who use their overseas accounts to pay for their Spanish mortgages and essentials such as utility services and council taxes, have been required by Spanish banks to produce a residence ...
Continue reading Non-Resident Brits in Spain Need Tax ID
September 10th, 2008
There has been much controversy since the beginning of the year, over the decline in the housing market in Spain, created by the continued instability of the economy. However, this has continued to beg the question, “So why do they keep on building?” A recent report conducted by the Association ...
Continue reading Crisis in the Spanish Construction Industry?
September 9th, 2008
After my gripe last week about all the bad news in the world of Spanish property, Jill (a Property Pulse reader) was kind enough to lift my spirits a little. During the week, other readers also told me about their Spanish property success stories - such a nice change ...
Continue reading Information = Power in Spain
September 9th, 2008
In recent weeks I have been furiously deleting email after email from property companies hyping the latest thrilling investment opportunity. As you might expect, none of these opportunities are to be found in the blighted UK property market but increasingly further afield, in fact, as far as possible from these shores. The ...
Continue reading Foreign Property – A Flight From Reality?
September 8th, 2008
The downturn of economic activity in the eurozone has come as a surprise to many observers. The credit crisis appeared to be less severe in the eurozone than in the US and, apart from Spain and Ireland, none of the eurozone member countries experienced serious problems in the housing market. ...
Continue reading ECB Must End Euro's Wild Rise
September 5th, 2008
Fitch Ratings has downgraded six sets of Spanish mortgage securities issued by Banco Santander, heightening concerns that the damage from Spain’s property crash is spreading to the country’s strongest lenders. The loans were “sliced and diced” and packaged in an identical way to sub-prime mortgage bonds in the US, belying claims ...
Continue reading Concern Over Spanish Bank Securities
September 4th, 2008
I'm as guilty as anyone of seeing the Spanish property market solely through the perspective of press articles. Unfortunately, most of the bad news seems to be factual and backed-up by reliable data, and most of the good news is, more often than not, just promotional fluff. However, this morning, ...
Continue reading A Different Perspective on Spanish Property
September 4th, 2008
Spanish house sales dropped steeply in June, deepening a property crisis that dates back to the start of the year and analysts say is likely to worsen in 2009. House sales dived 29.6 percent in June from a year earlier after a 34.3 percent drop in May, the Economy Ministry's National ...
Continue reading Inevitable Fall for Spanish Property
September 3rd, 2008
Spanish property group Colonial, which is struggling under huge debts, reported a €2.38bn (£1.9bn) first-half loss as the value of its assets tumbled. The net loss compared with a profit of €316m a year earlier, as Spain's decade-long property boom ended. Colonial has written down the value of assets, including €800m for ...
Continue reading Spanish Property Group Loses €2bn
September 2nd, 2008
The August Spanish property news has been almost uniformly bad - as bad as the property news in the UK. Most commentators agree that the pain will continue well into 2009, so we should expect bad news to be the norm for a while yet. If you've been keeping an ...
Continue reading Treading Carefully with Off-plan Property in Spain
