The monthly home sales figures paint a picture of a market coming off the boil but still near record levels.

There were 44,569 home sales witnessed by notaries in January, a decline of 7% on the year before, according to the latest data from the notaries’ association.

As you can see from the chart above, the market has been slowly coming off the boil since January 2022, when home sales grew by an annualised 36%, falling to a decline of 18% by December. 

However, if you look at January sales going back to 2007 (next chart), this January was the second best on record since 2007, so negative growth does not mean the market is anywhere near a slump, at least not yet.

If you look at quarterly figures going back to 2008 (next chart) you clearly see the post-pandemic boom that lifted sales to levels not seen since the boom in the noughties, and which we are now seeing running out of steam.

And if you look at the 12-month rolling sales total and its year-on-year change (next chart), which helps to smooth out the ups and downs of each month, and give you a clearer picture of the trend, you once again see that the post-pandemic growth (blue area line) has petered out, but sales (dark columns) are still near record levels.

Regional picture

Looking at sales by region of most interest to foreign buyers, sales declined in all areas with the exception of the Valencian region, where they increased by 5%. They fell the most in the Balearics (-28%), followed by Madrid (-18%), Andalusia (-8%), Catalonia (-6%), Murcia (-6%), and the Canaries (5%).

Spanish house prices in January 2023

National average prices fell by 1.45% in January according to the notaries, the first decline since April 2021, at the end of a period when prices were driven down by the pandemic. The next chart illustrates the price change going back to the start of 2020, just before the pandemic, and the recent trend is clear: the post-pandemic price boom is over.

Looking at price change in selected regions, price growth was still positive in all regions bar the Balearics, where prices declines 21%, similar to sales. Price growth was still positive in all other regions led by Madrid (+9%), the Canaries (+8%), Catalonia (+5%), Andalusia (+3%), the Valencian region (+2%), and Murcia (+1%).