Spanish Property Costa Comparison
January 29th, 2009
Thanks to a new series of Kyero.com property guides, you can now identify those parts of the Spanish coastline where you are most likely to find a Spanish property bargain.
By defining each costa as the strip of land within 5km of the sea, and overlaying our historical house price data, we discovered how each costa had responded to the downward pressure on house prices. By comparing asking prices in Q1 2008 with Q4 2008, we created this table of most keenly discounted property on the Spanish coast.
Even though it is extremely doubtful that properties are being purchased anywhere near the asking price, this table gives buyers an idea of where vendors and their agents have a more realistic expectation of sales price.
| Costa | Q1 2008 | Q4 2008 | +/- % |
|---|---|---|---|
| Costa Azahar | € 256 K | € 229 K | -11% |
| Costa de la Luz (Huelva) | € 256 K | € 227 K | -11% |
| Costa Calida | € 216 K | € 199 K | -8% |
| Costa Valencia | € 233 K | € 216 K | -7% |
| Costas Garraf / Maresme | € 584 K | € 548 | -6% |
| Costa Dorada | € 311 K | € 300 K | -4% |
| Costa Almeria | € 201 K | € 195 K | -3% |
| Costa Tropical | € 254 K | € 250 K | -2% |
| Costa Verde | € 224 K | € 220 K | -2% |
| Costa Blanca | € 244 K | € 250 K | +2% |
| Costa del Sol | € 325 K | € 340 K | +5% |
With an 11% drop in asking prices last year, property vendors on the Costa Azahar in Castellon and the Costa de la Luz in Huelva appear to be the most willing to negotiate a realistic sales price.
At the other end of the scale, those on the Costa del Sol and the Costa Blanca appear to be unprepared to drop asking prices at all – in fact they increased last year by 2% and 5% respectively.
The Costa Blanca in Alicante province is flanked by Murcia’s Costa Calida to the south (showing an 8% discount), and the Costa Valencia to the north (showing a 7% discount). Further north is the chart-topping Costa Azahar (-11%), and further south is the Costa Almeria (-3%).
Faced with indicators such as these, I strongly suspect that property vendors on the Costa Blanca are losing buyers at the initial window-shopping stage to its neighbouring costas.
On the south coast, the Costa del Sol is at least in more consistent company with its eastward neighbour, the Costa Tropical recording a minimal 2% discount. Even so, it’s difficult to rationalise a 5% increase in Costa del Sol asking prices when common sense and market events indicate that house prices are actually falling.
Comparing absolute prices, the neighbouring costas of Almeria and Murcia offer the lowest price property on the Spanish coast at an average of € 195,000 and € 199,000 respectively.
At the other end of the scale, Barcelona’s twin coasts of Maresme and Garraf, weigh in with an average property price of € 548,000. No doubt this premium reflects the fact that Barcelona city, totem of Spain’s economic power, is situated right on the coast.
Martin Dell, Kyero.com
