Why Are Rentals in Marbella Growing at a Significant Rate?

The property market in the Marbella area continues to be rather slow, sure there has been an increase in the volume of transactions compared to the previous two years, but that would not be too hard to beat. The mindset of prospective buyers seems to fall into two distinct catergories : The, I want a massive reduction on asking price buyer, or the I have a good deal on the table, but I would rather rent for a little while before i commit to see where the market goes, type. For me, the biggest hurdle to overcome is total lack of empirical evidence on actual tranactions that buyers have access to in their home countries, but not here in Spain.

There are generally three sources of evidence, each with issues and one that has absolutely no resemblence to reality. The Ministry of Housing produces pure fiction. There is no credance whatsoever placed in their statistics and that isn´t just a bitter property agents opinion, most Spanish Nationals feel the same way. The office of National Statistics also tends to have a rather optimistic view and then there is Tinsa, that uses valuations. No one source will give you transaction values, hard evidence of where specifically the housing market is.

What relevance does this have to the title of this blog post, I here you ask. Welll, a great deal as it happens. Market credibility. Buyers are turning their thoughts towards rentals as they are finding difficult to get a true sense of where the market is actually headed. Of course there are blatant deals out there and when they are a genuine bargain, more often than not they get snapped up. It is the borderline priced properties that are causing buyers to get renting in the area and basically sit on their hands. Who can blame them.

There are also some great value rentals in the Marbella area at the moment, with prices in some cases, half of what they were five years ago. A developer in the Nueva Andalucia area, who produced some of the highest spec apartments I had seen for some time, realized that the sales market was and started furnishing apartments and renting them out on a long term. A huge 312m2 apartment could be rented for €1800 per month. Good value.