Spanish property search trend
I was having a look today at a tool that Google recently released called Google Trends. What it does is that for a given search term it will show you a plot of the searches for the term over the past 3 years. How cool is that (I know...I'm a geek!).
Anyway, I thought it would be really interesting to take a look at the trend in people searching for property in Spain over the past 3 years. There's definitely a downward trend, as I assumed there would be, but the actual search activity is changing in terms of traditional peaks and troughs.
I recorded a video to show you what I think. Take a look at it at:
Spanish property search trends video
I'd really like to know your comments too. What do you make of the trend in the search for Spanish property? How does this reflect the market? Any general comments welcome.
Click the link below to post your comment.
Thanks
Justin
Anyway, I thought it would be really interesting to take a look at the trend in people searching for property in Spain over the past 3 years. There's definitely a downward trend, as I assumed there would be, but the actual search activity is changing in terms of traditional peaks and troughs.
I recorded a video to show you what I think. Take a look at it at:
Spanish property search trends video
I'd really like to know your comments too. What do you make of the trend in the search for Spanish property? How does this reflect the market? Any general comments welcome.
Click the link below to post your comment.
Thanks
Justin
posted by Eye on Spain at 5:46 PM
38 Comments:
Intersting graph! I think the interest is definitely shifting to other countries. Spain has become too expensive for most now so it's only natural that people will begin to consider countries like Bulgaria more and more. Be interesting to see the trend this time next year. I wonder if Bulgaria will overtake Spain?
Thanks for the video.. fascinating stuff! The trends go to confirm what I had begun to suspect in as much as Spain is loosing popularity to other destinations like Bulgaria, Croatia..I am curious as to how the Spain trend would compare with places like Florida.. I'm off to google trends...
I think that there has been interest in countries in line with promotion from developers. everyone is looking for the next cheap deal and first it was Sapin and now that it is more expensive they're hoping to pick up bargains in Dubai, Bulgaria, Cyprus etc. What is interesting is that I know a couple of people who have looked at Bulgaria and decided against it due to it being a 'bandit country' and the short holiday season,( few countries have the year round weather of most of Sapin and Dubai is generally too hot for a lot of people all year. The thing about Spani is that by now most people either know someone who lives here or have at least had a holiday here and it's not an unknown risk. I read a property bulletin which says that investors are returning to Spain as it is reliable. We'll have to see!
In terms of property prices, end 2004 was definitely the peak. After that all the estate agents in Spain have commented that the market has cooled down. Besides with all the construction in Dubai and Bulgaria has created a buying spree in those countries. Some of the equivalent properties in Bulgaria are 1/10th compared to those in Spain. I cant say I am surprised by what the trend is showing. However, I do like the Google Trend site which you have brought to our attention. Well done. I will use it myself.
yes l agree with rob it is iteresting but l dont think Bulgaria will over take Spain because they are already asking people to pay prices only slightly below the Spanish prices for similar propeties,l think after the initial interest in Bulgaria wares off the trend will drift back to Spain.next years graph willbe similar to this years with a slightly widening gap in Spains favour.Regards Pat.
I strongly suggest you heed the advice on the bottom of the Google trends page before drawing any real conclusions from those graphs. Then check the results it gives for 'property hungary'. What's that old saying about lies, damn lies and statistics?
Thanks for taking us to the new Google Trends function – your analysis of the graph of searchers for ‘property spain’ was interesting.
As longer-term players (than some) in the Spanish property market, we at Homes Abroad Group have found that the off-plan investor (in Spain) has recently been replaced by the more serious and less fickle long-sighted would-be resident, looking either for a retirement home, or increasingly, to re-locate in order to achieve a change of career and of lifestyle, and are therefore more often than before in their 30s to 40s, and sometimes come complete with family, Volvo estate, dogs, jet-ski et al…! (and even granny and grandpa too!!).
In particular, recent events in the UK, including the 7/7 London Transport blasts, and the more insidious changes in social and civic legislation which to many have made living in GB less fun, more hassle and more worrying than it used to be, seem to be encouraging more and more people to seek out a future overseas – and in particular in Spain – still the No 1 preferred destination for Brits moving abroad!!
If George Walden (Ex-Tory MP - and always regarded as left of centre as Conservatives go) is to be believed in his Daily Mail article of Saturday 28th October (and I know you should not always believe what you read in the papers!), UK citizens are leaving the country at the rate of 350,000 per annum at the moment. As he pointed out, at that rate the city of Birmingham would be emptied within 3 years!!
The line on the ‘property spain’ graph which remained surprisingly level during 2006 is, in my view, likely to continue in the same way into 2007, and may even move slowly but steadily upwards during the year and beyond. The best news for sellers of property in Spain (again in my view) is that this represents consistent demand from more dependable, more committed and longer-sighted buyers than typically those who jumped on the off-plan bandwagon in the early 2000s, only to melt away (as they would) as and when the market peaked and then suffered from over-supply in 04 and 05, causing a levelling off and in many areas a fall in property prices.
We at Homes Abroad Group and Homes Abroad Spain are looking forward to 2007 as a busier and better year for selling property in Spain.
I found the video really interesting and stimulating. To make the graph more valuable we need to see the start position of the X scale and be confident that the start position for all comparators are the same. I have assumed that the results of the search are global and not restricted to the UK. However, the search string of "property Spain" does not refine between purchase, rent, lease etc. Therefore the peaks in January could easily reflect the post Christmas European blues when many folk are looking for their next holiday. The results for earlier years may give us a clue. Germany, past big property buyers in Spain have been hit heavily with overseas property taxes. It is understandable why they may well not be looking for investments outside of the fatherland. The UK tax payers have also taken a considerable bashing in recent years as the current government increases taxation to such punitive levels that disposable income for overseas investments become less of a realistic option. Couple this with the UK chancellors rumoured taxation plans for overseas property ownership, it's perhaps not surprising that trends may be in decline. This year we have seen some very negative media coverage on buying property in Spain. The TRvor Macdonald TV programme would not have helped, but there were plenty of other negative editorials to be found during the year. Spanish builders and authorities still need to clean up their act. Manana doesn't suit anybody else.
Fascinating stuff with lots of theories to consider. One consideration for the falling interest in Spain, could be the reasons why people choose to leave the UK in the first place. In relocation, it's usually (I would think) to chase the relaxed lifestyle whilst still being in a safe and friendly environment. The UK has become a chaotic roundabout of zero relaxation most of us want to get off. However, in my search for a relocation area in Spain and subsequent lengthly visit, one of the factors that almost put me off pursuing my dream - was the amount of British in the area I've chosen. Whilst I love British people, I wanted to integrate and adopt Spanish culture! Happily I decided that I could live with the best of both worlds and avoid any 'mini- roundabouts' at all costs.Manana suits me just fine- isn't that the whole point???
All interesting stuff butI think we really must take on board some of the previous comments about "lies, damn lies and statistics" and Tonzi's comments about what users may actually be searching for on Google. "Property Spain" is a very general search criteria and I know, as a web designer and marketer that Google statistics are used for all kinds of things to assist website promotion. I'm sure many of the searches would have been undertaken by estate agents, developers , website designers, marketers etc.etc.etc. so I wonder how much we can really read into some of these trends as property investors. Still, intersting topic which I'm sure will keep us all Googling for some time to come.
I was fascinated by the trend graphs and extremely interested to hear the comments made. Viviente Ltd has been promoting property in Spain for the past 2 years. In addition to retired or semi retired people wanting to leave the UK for a better lifestyle, Viviente Ltd has also sold many properties to younger people wanting to invest in the 'emerging' market of Spain's Murcia region. Even the younger buyers need to consider healthcare which, in Spain, is far superior to any of the so called emerging property markets. With excellent weather all year round and one of the healthiest places in the world to live according to the World Health Organisation, Spain is still the number one destination for British people looking for investment or permanent living. Additionally, several budget airlines already operate daily flights into the existing airport of Murcia and when the new international airport opens in 2 or 3 years time there will be many more flights from most UK airports making travelling between the UK and Spain cheap and easy. In my opinion the graph for 'property Spain' will show a steady increase in the number of people searching and ultimately buying Spanish properties, particularly in the region of Murcia.
Very interesting graph and comments from all.
The bad publicity hasn´t helped over the last year. What is it with these journalists- trying to deflect from the harsh realities of life as it now is in Britain maybe! I think a lot of people were interested in the balkan states but started to be put off, again by bad publicity,e.g. mafia gangs, etc! Spain will always be more popular because it a good climate, is cheaper than the UK (just) and most importantly, for a lot of people,easy to get to.Lots more I could say but will leave it at Viva España.
I agree to an extent about agents and web designers being a portion of the searchers for "property spain" but I suppose that this can be factored out over the entire period so you'd be left with a similar trend line reflecting the actual property searchers.
Although the data used may not be totally accurate it still gives an idea of the general trend. If this tool didn't work I don't think Google would have wasted their time on it. It's certainly interesting. For example, search for "christmas" and you'll see exactly what you expect.
This was really very interesting and thank you for doing it, can we have more of the same!
If you type 'Spain property' rather than 'property Spain' you get a different picture.So the order you type the words in gives different results.
chipmonk, if you overlay the two graphs i.e., enter "property spain,spain property" in Google trends you will see that the charts are practically identical. Click here to see what I mean.
Spain was popular, it was the only place really advertised to buy property for many years, Spain was a place where you could get a mortgage, get to the location quickly and cheaply, since then, TV programmes about buying in other countries etc means that people have a wider choice of investment and are more exposed by advertising campaigns and alternative financing options etc. More worryingly for the Spanish property owner is the reduction in Capital Gains Tax for non residents, this will open the floodgates to investment companies who have been sitting on property for the past few years, in the new years the market will become swamped with property for sale leading to a slump in prices, especially the Costa Del Sol . Spain will become more attractive a buying option to second home hunters especially when the market slumps in the New Year. Anyone who owns a property will have to be in it for the long term and be ready to ride the rough time ahead.
just out of interest I searched Leeds, London & spain property. The trend for London was similar to Spain however Leeds was flat through the same period.
There is no doubt in my mind that the sudden availability and high profile marketing of properties in Eastern Europe affected the Spanish property market. I believe what the graph shows is a gradual return to Spain for investors as it is a more stable and reliable market.
I think there are a combination of factors.The uk property market has flattened over the past two years impacting on confidence and as interest rates continue to rise this will continue to suppress demand. I agree with your blogger who talked about structural change in the buyers market and the publicity around land grab must have had a detrimental impact on the market. Finally the in year peaks could be linked to tv programmes (such as a place in the sun) running programmes about particular destinations.
I think interest in Spain has been diluted due to interest in other emerging areas.
However I think interest will come back due to the maturity of the market and close proximity to the UK.The current fixation with carbon emissions may put people of flying too far and benefit Spain.
Spain will have to adapt to the interest in other markets eg. reduction in massive estate agent percentage on resales , reduce bank charges Etc.
An excellent piece of work and well presented.
What is most interesting is that the trend for property France produces an almost identical plot to that for Spain, including the 2006 levelling effect. This would tend to support the idea of a change in the buyer profile. I am perhaps part of the profile as I have bought a property off plan for retirement
Hello
I believe Spain is still popular for many UK residents and that is why bulgaria have not caught up as of yet though there are coming close. I know for a fact emerging markets will outpace spain soon.
One theory of mine is that in general people buy what they know. Property interest is IMO related to holiday visits and wanting to come back for repeat holidays or for good. So, I typed in Spain, Bulgaria, to test my theory (general interest in Spain is going down). You can see a general down trend for Spain and a general flat trend for Bulgaria, but at a much lower level.
I point to a feature not mentioned so far: news reference volume about Spain and Bulgaria. You can see a generally flat trend with a peak for the train bombings in Madrid. And a lot of other rather weird news selections IMO.
Another feature not mentioned so far: region of origin of the searchers. Big surprise: double the number of searchers from Ireland compared to the UK. And of course lots of searches from Spain (probably expats!).
IMO this Google tool should tell more about the actual volumes and about the sampling methods used, for me to put more trust in the trends shown.
As a Google Labs product, it is still in the early stages of development. Also, it is based upon just a portion of our searches, and several approximations are used when computing your results. Please keep this in mind when using it.
But still, it is fun. Maurice.
When you type: Spanish property, Bulgarian property, you see a significant downtrend for Spain (probably becoming stable in 2006) and a stable interest in Bulgaria. Volumes are not very much lower for Bulgaria. More Irish searchers than British, followed by expats (?) from Spain. Maurice.
I think the British public are now looking beyond Spain and France. As more low cost airlines are taking up new routes, so the Brits are thinking of further afield and unknown territory. Bulgaria and Dubai are now very popular and alot of programmes on the Tv to do with selling property are based there. Check out Morocco on the trends chart. The next big thing??
How do the Cities, Regions, and Languages tabs work?
When the Cities tab is selected, Google Trends first looks at a sample of all Google searches to determine the cities from which we received the most searches for your first term. Then, for those top cities, Google Trends calculates the ratio of searches for your term coming from each city divided by total Google searches coming from the same city. The city ranking you see on the page and the bar charts alongside each city name both represent this ratio. When cities' ratios are fairly close together, the corresponding bar graphs will be roughly the same length, and the exact ranking between these cities is less meaningful.
The Regions and Languages tabs work just like the Cities tab. Google Trends uses IP address information from our server logs to make a best guess about where queries originated. Language information is determined by the language version of the Google site on which the search was originally entered.
Keep in mind that instead of measuring overall interest in a topic, Google Trends shows users' propensity to search for that topic on Google on a relative basis. For example, just because a particular region isn't on the Top Regions list for the term "haircut" doesn't necessarily mean that people there have decided to stage a mass rebellion against society's conventions. It could be that people in that region might not use Google to find a barber, use a different term when doing their searches, or simply search for so many other topics unrelated to haircuts that searches for "haircut" make up a very small portion of the search volume from that region when compared to other regions.
OK, now it makes sense that the Irish are relatively the biggest Spaniksh-property-searchers: they live in a lousy climate in houses worth almost one million euro :-) Maurice.
Having returned yesterday from Spain,purchased property in Orihuela Costa,Costa Blanca I found the trend very interesting. We did look at retiring to Spain in 2003, but unfortunately did not take it any further until this year, and found the prices have risen considerably. We have friends who are looking atproperites to retire to in Cyprus as it is more affordable now. Anyway, we are very happy with our purchase and will soon be on the other side !!!
Hi Justin, great video,Like most of your replies "Diversity" is the answer,we recently attended the "Place in the Sun Live" exhibition at the NEC(and yes for us males, AMANDA is even better in the Flesh!)where Morocco,Cape Verde, Thailand,Bulgaria(beats me)amongst others were very evident.
As for ourselves we are trying to get a place in Goa but the Indian "red tape"is longer than War & Peace!Yes you can buy in Goa but nobody has actually SOLD as yet....any tips ? Cheers Kevin
very interesting indeed and i think your interpretation is largely correct, it would be interesting to see how many of these searches turn into purchases. i´m sure theres data out there somewhere! meanwhile what i found even more interesting was comparing property spain to property england, especially when you look at the regions as well, west lothain and cork obviously wouldn´t be looking at buying england but look at liverpool where investors are supposed to be snapping up property!! notably the trend in england is very consistent and also consistently below spain, although i guess this could be put down to the fact that most people wouldn´t look on the net for a house in england. although it does beg the question why are estate agents spending so much money developing web pages that people clearly don´t use??
Hi Justin,
The graph was instructive. But only the view from Google hits. However, it does in some ways correspond to my own experiences.
Spanish property is now too pricey and the governments intervention in certain aspects of planning and other issues has played it's part.
Bulgaria which I have visited three times and puchased in is in my view vastly over developed in areas like Bansko. I think things are more static than they hoped and they have been too greedy. Also, they are a law unto themselves and not totally trustworthy. Dubui is also becoming overdeveloped and in my view the schemes environmentally frightening. Who wants to live in a shopping mall surrounded by a phoney ski run and golf course?
Overall I think investors are starting to take a back seat until the economy and a few other shocks get into focus!
Mike
I thought the opposite, that it's professional investors keeping the market level in Spain, Dubai and Bulgaria and that the post Christmas hikes of previous years were the public trying to escape January, February gloom. I think this year consumer confidence has been much lower, so dreams are being reined in or concentrating on UK property purchases.
Hope I'm wrong...
Hi Just seen the video, If i remember correctly Polaris World started their Advert campain around Christmas 2004, this might have something to do with the search spike,Regards, Paul.
Very interesting video and although the graph does show a slowdown in Spain property interest I am not sure it is representative of the true situation. I certainly hear every day of someone or someones friend is moving to Spain. Perhaps people prefer to attend the many exhibitions offering guidance, viewing trips etc rather than trolling the net. Many have sought property in Bulgaria, France etc but I am not sure the Spanish way of life and people is duplicated anywhere else.
JohnSpain....graphs and statistics? the fact is buyers for Spain are in fewer numbers than 2004. The questions are.....Will the numbers continue to go down and for how long? The Spanish market is remarkably robust and Brits will continue to buy in Spain, these other destinations do not have the three most critical factors, the best weather in Europe, a critical mass of Brits and easy access. The other destinations are a brief shot at speculation..... who would seriously consider retiring or relocating to Bulgaria or Dubai? Brits will continue to move to Spain and buy property in Spain the numbers will go up and some years they will go down but the longer term trend is steady.
Hi there I was just checking out your website and I think its very interesting keep up the good work
Much has been read and heard about supposed "Emerging Markets" and "Property Hotspots" but what does it all really mean. In essence it means an area that is unergoing growth and property price increases, but to maintain property price growth several other factors need to be considered. Apart from building properties at a breakneck speed does the area have plans for new infrastructure, power, water, roads, airports, hospitals, schools, the list is endless and will sooner or later have a bearing on price levels when things go out of equilibrium.
Consider the following you have purchased a property probably off plan before construction to either sell on completion to realise the capital growth, or as a longer term investment with rental incomes. OK so far so good.
Scenario 1, your off plan property is now ready you have made all appropriate payments and you wish to sell on,
a)Local Estate Agents will pay you lip sevice but are far more intersted in continuing to sell new off plan properties where their commisions are higher.
b) potential buyers are thin on the ground as they are all doing the same as you wished to do and buy off plan
Scenario 2, Your off plan property is complete you have made all appropriate payments and you wish to rent your property out. or scenario 1, you have failed to sell your property and need to realise some rental income to pay your possible mortgage and ongoing costs.
a)The rental market is awash with new build properties all trying to rent out, the growth in tourist numbers is exceeded by the number of rental properties available on the market.
b)Potential renters want to stay in established area with good services and infrastructure, not next door to the ever increasing number of construction sites.
c)finding English speaking rental agents who are dependable and trustworthy is difficult and expensive, take in account your low incomes as a result of a) & b) the % taken by the rental agent and you will probably find your bank balance reducing rather than increasing.
Other potential issues to consider
Ownership of land
Ownership of free hold
Reselling implications (especially where you have set up a company to buy your property)
Tax and fiscal obligations (as above)
Your exit plan
Remember you have read, heard, and no doubt been told by your Estate Agent that property prices are increasing by 20-30% per annum in this area! and yes they may well be but this figure is based on the average selling price, in an emerging market possibly 90% plus of these sales are off plan properties like yours, the resale markets may not be increasing at anywhere near these levels. Realising the potential capital gains quickly from an off plan property only really works where there is a balanced stock of available properties, and property types, and the levels of construction is supported by the local infrastructure.
So in summary consider what you really wish to acheive from your investment have a gameplan or agenda, get all your facts straight, dont just think about buying, think about selling and your exit plan. Have a contingency for financeal issues that may arise. Seriously consider if emerging markets are for you, or whether you would be better to invest in more stable traditional markets with proven infrastructre and economic stability.
I personally think people are now looking farther afield. There are a lot of countries that offer great lifestyles with much lower prices than Spain. Me, I'm off to buy some Dominican Republic Property!
Post a Comment
<< Home