Bulgarian Property Exhibition
- Thread starter Daddy
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G
Guest126
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Maybe people are starting to realise that real estate investments belong in the real world too, I would imagine that if there was a Bulgarian Equity Investment Show the turnout would be pretty small too!
My refenence to it being in the papers regarding fall off in numbers attending property shows was in a recent Sunday paper - think it was Sunday Business Post 19/11/06. They gave a few reasons for it happening. Fatigue, pausing for breath, interest rates to name but a few.
I think people are starting to get the message and staying away from this garbage, although I know that one big player is still selling strongly at very inflated prices to an albeit shrinking audience.
However the sharks of this world don't have to worry, there will always be plenty of suckers for this kind of scam. The three card trick is centuries old, but still makes a living for its operators -- it taps into peoples greed, which makes them blind to other issues
However the sharks of this world don't have to worry, there will always be plenty of suckers for this kind of scam. The three card trick is centuries old, but still makes a living for its operators -- it taps into peoples greed, which makes them blind to other issues
R
rmelly
Guest
could be a far reaching effect of McDowell's comments on Stamp Duty...
briancbyrne
Registered User
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I heard a good point recently which I wont claim to be my own - - given the price of the property (relatively cheap compared to Ireland BUT and it is a big BUT quite expensive to the average Bulgarian worker) it would seem that there is quite a small target market in terms of resale ... you would most probably end up trying to sell to another Irish or British buyer... just a thought
Not too many spanish people bought the apartments and villas along the spanish coast either!
I think the big issue is how big a tourist destination Bulgaria will become. If there are significant increases in tourism over the next few years then they will have more buyers.
I think the big issue is how big a tourist destination Bulgaria will become. If there are significant increases in tourism over the next few years then they will have more buyers.
Holiday home ownership in Spain is split around 50/50 between foreigners and Spaniards. What makes you think that it's all foreign owned?
C
cerberos
Guest
Inland Spanish
"Not too many spanish people bought the apartments and villas along the spanish coast either!"
What a strange comment.
July & August the Spanish coast is inundated with inland Spanish coming to the cooler coasts for their holidays.
"Not too many spanish people bought the apartments and villas along the spanish coast either!"
What a strange comment.
July & August the Spanish coast is inundated with inland Spanish coming to the cooler coasts for their holidays.
In fact, the split is currently well more than half in favour of Spanish buyers. In some parts of the Costa Calida for instance, Spaniards make up the vast majority of buyers. Even on the Costa del Sol, where many Irish bought cheaply in the late 1990s, some areas like San Pedro had developments that were almost entirely bought by Spaniards. In western Marbella at the moment most resales in the nicer apartment developments are to Spaniards from the big cities or to local professionals.
Equity release, the engine driving the Irish move to foreign property, is having a huge impact in Spain. Property in Madrid and other major cities has shot up in value in the last three or four years on the back of a booming economy, and these house owners are able to easily afford second homes on the south coast. I spoke to a developer in Aguilas a few months ago who is working on a development that will have its very own "fly-in" facility -- owners will be able to land on the private airstrip and taxi up to the door of their villas; this project is a very high-end one and they expect to sell most of it to Spaniards. We are not the only ones making a bit of money at the moment!
Comparisons between Spain and Bulgaria are simply not valid. Bulgaria has a ten week summer with a two week peak; Spain has more than 300 days of sunshine and a genuine year-round business with a good three months of peak season. More importantly though is the fact that Irish and English buyers are paying up to 300 and 400% of market value in Bulgaria for properties with effectively no resale value in the local market, unless they can offload them on other foreigners. The local market for this stuff at this price is ZERO!
This is a very risky place to be for investors. Having paid maybe four times the market value, with no possibility that the local population will ever buy these properties, and with no rental market, they are waiting for some as yet unheralded event to make it all better -- the proverbial miracle! To make it worse, those who have been caught are nearly all in complete denial, and many of them even encourage others to get involved.
Auto I agree that people are constantly in denial about making possible mistakes, but that cuts both ways those who bought when they shouldnt and those who had the opportunity and didnt take it. Judging by your constant slating of Bulgaria, i'd imagine you fall into the latter.
Having been in the business for a long time, I first looked at Bulgaria in the late 1990s following the collapse of the central bank and the Lev, and I have looked at it and visited it regularly since then. I never considered at any time getting involved there, despite very tempting offers from developers and agencies, and I have absolutely no regrets about that. In order to make money there, it would have been necessary for me to get involved in scamming the gullible, and I simply wouldn't go there -- there are plenty of ways to make money without preying on the innocent! I can still meet all the people I ever did business with and be happy that I treated them fairly; I could not do that if I had been involved in this market, particlarly the "guaranteed rental" scam.
I don't slate Bulgaria by the way, just the projects built and sold at grossly inflated prices to mostly first-time "investors" who believe sales talk and don't do the research. If you read my posts you will see that I have said that there are possible opportunities In Sofia for instance, if you know where to look. Bulgaria is a nice place with nice people, but that has nothing to do with investment.