House sales up, prices down

The General Council of Notaries has released its latest set of statistics suggesting that Spanish property sales increased by nearly 14% compared to last year, totalling just over 17,000 sales. In addition, and contradicting figures released by other organisations, property prices fell by an average of just over 8.5%. 

They stated that “ The upturn in housing sales in recent months is explained, in part, by the normalisation in the number of transactions following the end of the income tax deductions for home purchases implemented at the end of 2012, but also reflects a stabilisation in the monthly sales.”  

Specifically, the numbers of apartments sold increased by 14.2% compared to the same period in 2013, though this figure is derived from second hand apartment sales increasing by over 22% while new apartment sales fell by 17%. Sales of family homes rose by 12.7%. 

The average price per square metre of the homes purchased in August dropped by 8.6% to 1,111 euros. The drop in square metre price is driven by the fall in family home prices which fell by nearly 26%.  

There was also a reported improvement in the mortgage marketing, suggesting an increase of 31.5% in the number of mortgages granted for property purchases, while at the same time the average value of the loans fell to 103,630 - a drop of 8.9%. This increased access to finance has resulted in an increase of mortgage-funded purchases (38.8% in August), with the average mortgage amount accounting for nearly 74% of the price of the property.

property-quest-international.com