MADRID: Further evidence was provided last week by Spain’s notaries of the gradual return to good health of the Spanish residential property market, whose provisional figures for the month of June show that a total of 37,641 homes were bought and sold during the month.
Spanish property market continues stabilizationThis represents an increase in activity of 19.4% compared to the same month in 2014, and is the fifth consecutive monthly increase after a brief blip in the growth of the market in January, which was probably due to the rush to sell in December in the face of new tax rules which came into force at the start of this year.
The data compiled by the country’s notaries also reveal an average price per square metre of 1,260 euros, only 0.3% lower than twelve months previously, which suggests that stability has now just about been achieved in the market value of Spanish real estate.
At the same time the tendency for second-hand sales to outstrip those of new-build apartments continued, with the latter category accounting for only 3,559, or 9.4% of all properties changing hands, despite a year-on-year increase of 2.2%. Second hand apartment sales rose by 25.2% to just over 25,000, the highest total since December, while detached house sales also rose by 14.5% to 7,633.
The average price of new-build apartments fell in June by 1.8% compared to the year before, while in the second-hand market an increase of 0.4% was noted.
As has become normal over the last twelve months, the amount of financing for property purchases through mortgage loans also increased, with the 16,002 loans registered in June representing an increase of 31.8% over the sixth month of 2014, and the average loan capital increasing by 4.6% to 121,445 euros.
All of which lends further weight to the assertion, repeated in the June bulletin by the notaries, that the Spanish property market is continuing to stabilize after an eight-year slump which has seen prices fall by a total of 33.2%.