Info on buying property, real estate business in the Algarve Portugal

As published in the A Place in the Sun magazine, the Algarve Portugal was chosen as number one of their top 20 recommended property destinations and the country Portugal came in third in their top places to make money in real estate in Europe. Portugal and in particular the algarve is an evergreen in the overseas property market.

When investors look into investing in property and real estate their main focus is return on investment. Two other criteria is the increase of value over time of their property and third how much they can earn with the property during the have it in their possession.

Real estate abroad, Less risk, more lifestyle

Although some investors are attracted by the emerging markets such as Croatia, Hungary, Slovenia, Mexico and Argentina more and more they are returning to the well-established traditional markets like Portugal, Spain and France. They feel the risk of investing in property and real estate in the emerging money doesn’t match the return they see on those investments.

Portugal experienced by far the biggest holiday home growth in Western Europe. This fact is based of one the larger holiday rentals websites active in Portugal and all other countries within Europe. The number of Portuguese properties available to let through the website has increased from 300 properties to just below 1,000 properties in the last 12 months, which is an increase of over 300 percent. The main growth in properties was properties located in the East Algarve and West Algarve.

Two kinds of buyers of property

The two groups of buyers of property abroad being the investors and on the other hand the lifestyle buyers are merging more and more. Lifestyle purchasers’ shopping lists used to include a second home that was attractive and was close to beaches, golf courses and town centers with a view if possible. Now they want all that but are also looking for returns on capital appreciation and resale of the property. This group is very active in the algarve Portugal which make up a great part of the client of real estate agents in the algarve.  

The investor, who in the past just looked for return on property now also looks a bit further. Why not own real estate solely as an investment but also enjoy and use it yourself.

Financing real estate abroad

In the past financing property in Portugal was proven to be very difficult. Now with a lot more banks operating in Portugal financing ral estate has become a lot more transparent and easy. This goes not only for investors buying real estate in Portugal but also for the private property buyers. The conditions for financing property in Portugal are in a lot of cases even better than in the countries of origin. This advantage can go up to 20% cheaper financing property in Portugal versus for instance the UK.

When to buy property or real estate in the Algarve Portugal

The best time to buy a property is as early on in the planning or construction stage as possible. Although with nowadays ways of marketing use tours and impressions buying a property off plan still requires some level of vision. This si confirmed by real estate agents but the mention that a mud filled building site does slow up the selling process a bit.

Of course, purchase your beautiful shiny new property when completed, but this will come at a price. It is expected that during construction the price of the real estate will go up with 20% during construction from the original off plan price. So when buying a property in Portugal try to buy at the beginning in order to get the most of purchasing a property.

This info is based on a article placed in the resident by David Westmoreland