2023 is the year of decline for housing. HE number buying and selling Registered between January and May this year lower 4% According to the National Institute of Statistics to the same period of 2022. In the first months of this year, 261,784 housing transactions were registered, compared to 272,922 in the previous year.
The situation is not the same in every region of Spain: 13 out of 17 autonomous communities (including Ceuta and Melilla) sales are fallingin two it stays practically flat and in the other two it rises with some force.
The region where the number of transactions decreased the most was La Rioja with 19.68%.; It was followed by the Comunidad de Madrid (13.23%) and the Balearic Islands (16.86%), which recorded double-digit numbers. Other communities are in decline, but not acute: Galicia (-9.72%), Castilla La-Mancha (-8.13%), Melilla (-5.86%), Ceuta (-5.22%), Islas Canary Islands (-4.95%), Aragon (-4.46%), Andalusia (-4.63%), Catalonia (-3.25%), Navarra (-3.13%), and Cantabria (-2%) , 7).
at opposite points Principality of Asturias, Valencian Community And Castile and LeonCompared to the same period of 2022, the market activity and the number of houses sold continued between January and May 2023, Increased 10.22%, 5.92% and 2.37%, respectively. In Murcia and the Extremadura Region, the figures for this year and the previous year are almost the same.
Which provinces have the highest decline?
By province, the behavior is uneven: on the one hand, Avilawhere is she the number of sales increased by 32.82% According to 2022, between January and May of this year, on the other hand, Huescawhere is she The collapse of residential real estate operations reached 22.89%.
Besides Ávila, the provinces with the highest double-digit sales growth were Segovia (17.68%), Zamora (16.78%), Teruel (11.54%) and Asturias (10.22%). On the opposite side, in addition to Huesca, the biggest drops are La Rioja (-19.68%), Guadalajara (-17.83%), Balearic Islands (-16.86), Zamora (-16.78%) Lugo (% -16.45) ) and Álava (-15.73%).
Is the drop in sales worrying?
Sales figures were higher in 2021 and 2022. Without going further, figures similar to those in 2007 were achieved last year amid the real estate ‘boom’. The change in the monetary policy of the central banks with the rise in interest rates has a direct impact on the real estate market as it makes the cost of financing more expensive. This should be a deterrent when buying a housebecause it’s a market where resorting to debt is the usual thing.
Real estate portal Fotocasa believes it is appropriate to compare the figures for 2023 with those from 2019, the year before the pandemic broke out: “After two years of major sales activity caused by the pandemic, real estate is starting to stabilize somewhat. In May, trades are 16% compared to the same month of 2019. In the annual calculation, 2023 operations (261,784) sold 224,581 houses in January, February, March, April and May 2019. This comparison shows that 2023 started with very intense and very positive data.showing great flexibility of real estate in the face of economic turmoil