I will kick off a series of reports looking at foreign demand for property in Spain with a review of the main figures quantifying Swedish demand, which has been growing strongly in recent years. How many Swedes buy property in Spain each year? How are their numbers changing? Where do they buy? How much do they spend? All these questions will be answered, along with some insight from an industry expert with specialist knowledge of the Swedish market. This report took me a lot of time to prepare so it’s restricted to registered readers only. Registration is free for now.
Click all charts to enlarge.
Size of the Swedish market
How does this market compare?
Evolution of demand
Growth compared to other foreign markets
Swedish demand by Spanish autonomous region
Autonomous regions
Provinces
Budgets
Observations from the front line
Industry expertise from Daniel Nilsson, CEO of Fastighetsbyrån Overseas, the international division of Sweden’s biggest estate agency. Web: http://fastighetsbyran.se/overseas
What are the different segments of demand?
Pricewise our average price in 2016 was €209,000, where Q1 is at €110,000, median at €155,000, and Q3 at €245,000. 90% of our buyers are Swedish, and with more than 700 sales in 2016 I wouldn’t think that differs from what our competitors see. The main bulk is concentrated on the peninsula, 54% on Costa Blanca and 29% on Costa del Sol this year. We also see increasing demand for ”big” cities like Barcelona, Alicante and Málaga, not only the traditional destinations.
What are their preferences when it comes to buying in Spain? What are they looking for?
2 bed apartment (70%) or small townhouse (20%), within an hour from nearest airport, close to the beach and amenities.
What are their main concerns about buying property in Spain?
Legal concerns, also debts and other hidden costs
Are they easy clients to deal with? Do they have any peculiarities?
Quite easy, quite loyal. But less impulsive than for instance the British or Norwegian. Most of them speak good English but like any nationality they prefer to buy properties in their own language.
Compared to other nationalities, what are their budgets like? Are they cash buyers or do they need mortgages?
Most of them don’t look for ”110% mortgage”, rather the Swedish have some savings and a good private economy when they start looking for a second home. A lot of them remortgage their property in Sweden, although we will see that number decrease as the mortgage regulations changed recently in Sweden.
Do you see this demand growing or shrinking?
Increasing, and demand for mortgage in Spain from the Swedish will rise due to new regulations as explained above.
In terms of marketing, what works and what doesn’t with this nationality?
As much information as possible on the individual properties (good photos, description, floor plans, etc etc) which is what they’re used to from the domestic market. Info on the entire process, step by step. Traditionally the property exhibitions have worked well but we believe there may be a shift coming here towards even more online searches. With cheap and frequent flights to Spain the need to meet somebody (exhibitions, collaborators) on Swedish ground decreases.
What other countries do they look at apart from Spain?
Spain is very dominant and other countries can’t be compared on the same chart, really. But second and third would be Portugal and southern France. Thailand and Turkey used to compete with Spain in some way, but the instability of both has led to a dramatic fall in demand.
Mike51 says:
Thanks for that, Mark. Very interesting though I’m not a Swede. Mike.
Sofilidgren1 says:
Thank you, I have seen an increase in friend my Swedish friends buying properties, so it made me question the quantity of sales. I do live in Australia though., just the logistic of the distance makes it hard for me to contemplate having property there.