House Prices in Spain 2016

For some time we have been predicting that the Spanish property market had bottomed out and now figures have come in to show that for 2015, house prices finally began to rise.

Home Sales in Spain Climbed by 9.8% in 2015

Sales of homes in Spain increased by 9.8% during 2015, reaching a total of 401,281 transactions. According to the latest statistics published by the Spanish Government’s Ministry of Public Works, this represents the third consecutive year of increases in home sales and the greatest volume of transactions since 2010.

The Ministry’s data shows that the growth is mainly due to the second hand housing market, which accounted for 340,753 of the transactions (89%), and is 13.4% more than the figure for 2014. In contrast, sales of new homes, which represented 11% of the total, dropped by 10.6% over the previous year, to 41,938 transactions.

Looking at only the data for the fourth quarter of 2015, El Mundo reported that a total of 114,598 homes were sold, which represents an increase of 2.4% compared to the fourth quarter of 2014. Moreover, to find a fourth quarter with more transactions one must go back to 2010, when 150,494 transactions were registered.

All of Spain’s regions recorded increases in home sales during 2015, with the exception of Castilla-La Mancha, which registered a decline of -0.8%. Among the greatest increases registered were those for the Balearic Islands (+17.4%), the Basque Country (+17%), Cantabria (+16.6%), Murcia (+16.3%) and Aragón (+14.3%).

With regard to the provinces, the steepest increases were recorded in: Segovia (+28.5%); Vizcaya (+24.8%); Cádiz (+21.4%); the Balearic Islands (+17.4%); Cantabria (+16.6%); Murcia (+16.3%); Valencia (+14.8%) and Zaragoza (+14.8%). In contrast, among the provinces with the greatest declines are: Ciudad Real (-9.5%); Guadalajara (-7.5%); Ávila (-4.9%); Cáceres (-4.8%) and Salamanca (-4.2%).

The Ministry also highlighted that transactions carried out by foreign residents in Spain experienced year-on-year growth for the 18th consecutive quarter, rising by 9.9% compared to the fourth quarter of 2014, to a total of 18,029 homes sold, while purchases by non-resident foreigners amounted to 1,453 transactions during the quarter, representing an increase of 10.3%. Altogether, some 19,482 housing transactions were carried out by foreigners (resident and non-resident), representing 17.0% of the total transactions in the quarter.

The provinces which recorded the greatest numbers of home purchases by foreign residents, were: Alicante (3,910); Málaga (2,377); Barcelona (1,621); the Balearic Islands (1,426) and Madrid (1,406).