Home loans in Spain

According to figures released by Spain's National Statistics Institute yesterday, the average amount of morgage loans authorised by Spanish banks rose by 18.1 percent in August (compared to the same month in 2005) and reached 146,762€. The overall value of bank home loans rose by 32.1 percent.

In August a total of 131,180 mortgages were authorised to customers buying rural and urban properties in Spain and the overall value of these mortgages rose to 19,252 million euros.

As usual Spain's savings banks got the biggest share of the home loan market - 53.42 percent - followed by normal banks (36.88 percent) and other lending companies (9.7 percent).

Over ninety percent of mortgage loans corresponded to purchases of properties in the so-called "precio libre" (free price) category and just 9.9 percent to purchases of "protected" properties whose selling price is controlled by the government.

As far as yearly figures are concerned, the number of mortgaged properties in Spain has so far risen by 9.82 percent this year, while the total amount of loans has shot up by 24.87.

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British property buyers prefer Spain

According to a study just published by Barclays Bank, the number of UK residents buying property abroad is set to double, and a third of potential property buyers named Spain as their preferred overseas destination.

According to the results of Barclay's study, five percent of UK residents (2.2 million people) already own a property overseas, and another 2 million definitely intend to buy one. And a very high 37 percent of those surveyed for the study said they are considering the possibility of buying a property abroad at some time in the future.

Spain remains the firm favourite among British overseas property buyers, with the US coming second and France third.

Not surprisingly, the main things putting UK citizens off the idea of buying property abroad are legal and tax complications, the possibility of being misled or deceived by local property sellers, and the difficulty of adapting to a new language and culture.

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