OHL sees Spanish property crisis lasting until 2011
Thursday, July 17, 2008 @ 6:06 PM
The crisis in Spain's real estate sector will last until 2011 due to the large number of new homes already on the market, general manager for builder OHL Luis Garcia-Linares said on Wednesday.
There are between 500,000 and a million empty, new houses waiting to be sold on a market that has stagnated over the last year after more than a decade of robust growth, Linares said.
"The sector's problem is that we have a very significant stock level which needs to be absorbed," Linares said in a presentation.
Fears of a collapse of the country's property sector arose on Monday when property group Martinsa Fadesa filed for administration after it failed to meet conditions to refinance a huge debt pile.
Linares said OHL would not suffer directly from the real estate slowdown as its core business was focused on infrastructure rather than housing.
Source Reuters