Spanish property sales fell -17.7% in 2020
The number of property transfers registered in the property registers (from public deeds) in December 2020 was 150,891, which is 9.1% more than in the same month of 2019.
In the case of registered property sales, the number of transfers is 76,516, with an annual increase of 7.2%. 84.3% of the sales registered in December correspond to urban properties and 15.7% to rustic properties. In the case of urban property, 56.0% were sales of homes, according to data from the INE.
The number of sales of rustic properties increased by 18.5% in December, on the annual rate, and that of urban properties by 5.3%. Within the latter, sales of homes registered an annual increase of 3.7%. This is good news. Considering the damage the covid restrictions did in the early stages of the pandemic, it is nice to see the market showing signs of recovery.
20.5% of the homes transferred by sale in December were new properties, while 79.5% were second-hand. The number of sales of new homes represented an increase of 12.6%, while the sales of second-hand homes increased by 1.6% when compared to December 2019.
Results by Autonomous Communities
In December, the total number of transferred properties registered in the property registers per 100,000 inhabitants reached its highest values in La Rioja (679), Castilla y León (627) and Aragón (586).
Galicia (33.3%), Extremadura (32.0%) and Cantabria (23.0%) register the highest annual variation rates.
The Canary Islands (–17.6%), the Balearic Islands (–13.6%) and Región de Murcia (0.9%) presented the lowest annual rates.
In terms of registered home sales, the communities with the highest number of transfers per 100,000 inhabitants are Valencia (132), La Rioja (120) and Cantabria (119).
The highest annual increases in the number of home sales were La Rioja (37.2%), Galicia (28.8%) and Cantabria (28.3%).
The Balearic Islands (–20.0%), the Canary Islands (–16.5%) and Foral de Navarra (–7.6%) recorded the greatest decreases.
In Andalucía, there was 7,323 home sales in December, a year-on-year increase of 3.9%.
With all of the year’s figures now released we can see that during 2020, Andalucía saw a total of 83,760 home sales. This represents a negative annual variation of -16.3%. This is not far from the national variation. Spain recorded a drop in sales of -17.7% with a total of 415,748 home sales across the country throughout 2020.
Communities that suffered more during 2020 were the Balearic Islands (–23.2%), the Valencian Community (–22.1%) and the Canary Islands (–21.9%).
