Segmentation in the Spanish Property Market
Reports on the death of the Spanish property market are premature. The market is starting to recover slowly after two years of falling prices and the patent lack of lending from the banks. As the banks are now loosening up their lending for anyone with some money to put aside as deposit especially on their own repossessed stock they are wanting to finance 100% where possible to get the liability off the books.
The recovery is not everywhere though and not all types of property are recovering and I certainly do not expect to see price rises any time soon. With that in mind, I will give you some examples where I do not see falls abating currently and then tell you what a prime property consists of. This segmentation of the market is a very important concept to understand because without it you treat all properties in the same way and that is not how to look at the Spanish Property market, it is not a monolithic whole.
For a property to be considered “prime” it must have an intrinsic value which is easily measured. “Sub-prime” property does not have this same intrinsic value. Sub-prime is a lot more prone to sentiment and demand within the market. There is little or no demand for “sub-prime” property outside the big cities and their periphery. A good example would be a series of properties built on an estate where everything is similar inland and away from the beach with few facilities around and where everyone must use the car for all journeys. (It is impossible to segment the properties on this estate, they all fall into the same category of sub-prime). It is likely that transport costs will rise bit by bit over the next few decades and these properties will become less and less desirable as a result. The opposite is also true of course meaning that prime properties with little distance to travel in conurbations and with good facilities become more desirable. This will mean that their prices rise while the sub-prime group drops increasing the disparity in prices between prime and sub-prime.
Spanish coastal properties will be another sector to suffer if they do not have rapid access to the coast. The description “coastal property” has been abused so that it includes properties even a couple of miles or more from said coast and therefore it is easier to make a segmentation in this area. My own opinion is that if you cannot walk comfortably to the beach with all your things for a day by the sea in hand then you do not have what can be termed a coastal property. First line property with uninterrupted views of the sea and even second and third with good sea views will hold their value quite well because evidently they have a prime position and there is a limited supply. Anything further back can no longer be considered prime and the segmentation is evident in the disparate prices.
What type of property will hold its value? Large city centres are good bets as people move ever more so into cities and large towns to look for work. These areas keep their value as the demand curve outstrips the supply curve in almost every case. A city centre flat is a city centre flat and nothing can create more space in those cities meaning there are limited numbers available because of planning restrictions and replacement new for old. The centre of a city therefore is a segment. Spanish cities have no more land available for development in the centre of so there is very little possibility of supply outstripping demand if people continue moving to the city,something that continues to be the trend for the whole of Spain.
Other properties that will hold their values are those that have a little something special, spectacular views, fantastic and timeless design, built in and unobtrusive security features, shopping and leisure facilities and more. When you wrap all of these things up into a whole in just one property then you have the perfect property investment which is bound long term to hold its value and you also get quite a nice place to live too. It is the perfect segment.