The residential property market in Spain is set to bottom out next year and see a 2% rise in prices in 2016, according to ratings agency Standard & Poor’s.
It is well documented that the fall in prices has been slowing in recent months and the agency is predicting that prices will fall overall by 2% this year compared with 4.6% in 2013.
Property prices in Spain have fallen around 30% since the economic downturn hit the country’s real estate markets in 2008.
S&P says that the positive outlook for the property market is down to a faster than expected recovery of the Spanish economy and a subsequent quicker fall in unemployment.
According to the Spanish Central Bank the country’s economy grew by 0.5% in the second quarter of 2014, the fastest rate in six years, and the latest job figures show that 192,000 people had joined the country’s workforce in the 12 months to the end of June.
Experts say there has been a change in trends in the Spanish property market in the last 12 months with the arrival of British and US property funds who are taking advantage of the offers in the Spanish property market.
But the market is unlikely to recover everywhere at the same pace. It is predicted that properties on the coast, including areas popular with second home owners, will see prices rise first.
However, according to S&P the long term recovery of the property market could be kept on a leash by the high number of properties on the market in Spain and the country’s population decline could also put a brake on the long awaited recovery.
S&P said in January that Spain’s housing market was overvalued by somewhere in the region of 12% to 20%. According to Mark Stucklin of Spanish Property Insight, Standard & Poor’s is a bit more pessimistic than other agencies, who believe a recovery may begin as early as 2015.
Several reports in recent weeks have spotlighted the slowdown in the price declines, prompting different analysts to predict the bottom of the market may be nearer.
