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Last Updated on 29/05/2023 by STEPHANE

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Are there any Spanish bank repossessions left on the Costa Blanca?

 

Last year we wrote our article on the bank repossessions in Spain: Spanish bank repossessions: Your ultimate guide to 120.000 repossessed properties. Many foreigners started to check the Spanish real estate market since the crisis of 2008. Of course, prices are rising and currently are at 1.590€ per square meter but we wanted to check ten year after the crisis if there were any bank repossessions left on the Costa Blanca. We did the work for you.

We did the search for the Costa Blanca as, with the region of Murcia, the region of Alicante remains one of the cheapest where you can find sun 320 days per year, check here the monthly weather statistics for any Spanish, while being close to the sea. If you want to compare the prices of the different regions, have a look at our quarterly report: The Spanish property market: our detailed analysis of the top 20 markets!

Before starting, remember, the Spanish government helped to clean the situation arising from the crisis, thanks to pooling “bad assets” – understand, assets for which the mortgage was worth more than the property value.

Where can you find bank properties? First, you can find those at all the major Spanish banks. Second, you can find those at the Sareb. Sareb was created to manage the assets from many Spanish Banks.

 

What have we found?

We found many properties listed under 50.000€… even some under 20.000€ listed on all the Spanish bank portals publishing the bank repossessions.

In total, we found:

• more than 4.500 properties
• more than 1.400 plot of land
• more than 3.500 properties listed for less than 150.000€

 

Why buy a Spanish bank property?

Better financing conditions

• Aggressive price as the bank wants to take it off its balance sheet. This was true after the crisis, now we note that the banks are more and more greedy on one hand, on the other hand, bank sold from time to time all their portfolio of properties in one go.
• More lending: one of the big advantages is that you can get a bigger loan … up to 100% of the Value of the property. In general, foreigners would have difficult to get more than 70%. For more information about mortgages, read our most read article: Your definitive guide to your Spanish Mortgage: How to apply? How to get the best rates? or alternatively Have a quick look at our Spanish mortgage calculator to know your buying power.

 

 

• Better financing conditions: Find the current mortgage conditions in our last paper: What are the best Mortgage rates in Spain?

 

What is the current situation on Spanish foreclosures?

Why are there so many bank repossessions properties in Spain?

As you can see from our table “Returns and mortgages in Spain“, there are about 25 million properties in Spain. Before the crisis of 2008, about 0.8 million properties were sold per year in Spain.

In 2016, 456.000 properties were sold and 73.000 were foreclosed, i.e. less than 0.3% of the properties in Spain.

For 2017, 27.171 properties were foreclosed, (housing and others) i.e. 0.1% of all the properties existing in Spain.

In 2018, the number of foreclosed properties is strongly lower than in 2017.

It is very good news that the current economic situation in Spain is improving as you could read in our article we wrote earlier this month: Spanish GDP growth to remain strong up to 2021.

Look at the evolution of foreclosure in Spain in our earlier article.

 

Is it a good time to buy a bank repossessed property in Spain?

Most of the bank foreclosed properties will be off the market very soon. They were one of the main driving force for Spanish property prices to go down (with the economic situation and the fact that banks were lending less heavily). Right now, all those three forces are going in the opposite direction: we have fewer properties on the market, we have a nice economic activity and Spanish bank are lending more aggressively: What are the best Mortgage rates in Spain?

 

Last but not least, real estate prices are rising in Spain: check the chart of real estate price evolution before and after 2007:

 

We found an institutional investor buying bank repossessions in Spain for more than 10 years, so, we guess that it is not such a bad deal to buy bank properties.

 

Which regions have the highest foreclosure rate in Spain?

• Region of Murcia
• Andalusia
• Valencian community (of which the Costa Blanca)

 

 

Our Tips before buying a bank property:

• Don’t dream, if they are on the market, there could be a reason, be cautious.
• Read our useful paper on this: Our top 10 pieces of advice for buying your property in Spain
• Always hire a lawyer to check the situation of the property and to clear any legal hurdle. Find your property lawyer or tax adviser anywhere in Spain
• Technical check with an architect or property surveyor? Those properties could be old or new but unfinished or empty for a while… this means a lot of surprises.
• How to pay in £,$,¥ Pounds, Dollars, Francs, Yuan for my Spanish property?
• Study properties in the neighbourhood in order to make the perfect offer for the bank.
• Location not always terrific: pay attention to the location.
• Submit a bid directly to the branch manager, even better if you are a customer.
• Ask the local branch manager if they are properties not listed online.
• Have a look at all our best partners’ deals in Spain: we have the connections with local lawyers working for foreigners in many languages in all the Spanish regions and we have other interesting contacts in our network.

 

 

Your easy guide to help you find your foreclosed property in the Costa Blanca

How have we sorted the properties?

In order to help your Search, we have created a table with direct links towards those portals.

You will learn:

• How many residential properties are listed for each portal on the Costa Blanca? In total, we found more than 4.500 properties.
• How many properties are listed under €150.000 on the Costa Blanca?
• How many plot of lands are listed for sale on the Costa Blanca?

Of course, if you are looking for garage, trastero, offices or industrial properties, you can find those as well.

 

At the end of this section, you will find our exclusive table (easier to read on a computer, difficult to fit so many data in a readable table for mobile users, sorry) regrouping all the Spanish bank websites with the repossessed properties.

Our tip: As you know, some banks are more active than others in some regions. Always try to know which one you should check for your region… a small local bank could be much better than a large national bank for finding your dream property in a certain region.

Residential properties and Land repossessed on the Costa Blanca

The three real estate bank portals with the most Residential properties for sale in the Costa Blanca are:

1. Haya Real Estate: Haya Real Estate is the portal of Bankia. Bankia is the result of a merger of six smaller banks. They have more than 1.200 repossessed residential properties listed for the Costa Blanca.
2. Servihabitat: Servihabitat is the portal from “la Caixa Bank”. CaixaBank is the leading retail bank in Spain, with the largest customer base. They have more than 600 repossessed residential properties in the Costa Blanca.
3. Sareb: Sareb is a company created to manage assets from many Spanish banks. As of June 2017, the portfolio of Sareb has 39 billion euros, of which 30% is real estate. They have more than 500 repossessed residential properties on the Costa Blanca.
4. Altamirainmuebles: Altamirainmuebles is the real estate portal of Banco Santander, the largest bank in Spain. They have more than 500 bank repossessed homes on the Costa Blanca

Find more residential bank repossessions on our exhaustive table of all the Spanish bank web portals at the end of this article.

 

Land Bank repossessions in the Costa Blanca region:

The four real estate bank portals with the most plots for sale are:

1. Altamirainmuebles: Altamirainmuebles is the real estate portal of Banco Santander, the largest bank in Spain. They have more than 500 bank repossessed plot of land on the Costa Blanca
2. Sareb: Sareb is a company created to manage assets from many Spanish banks. As of June 2017, the portfolio of Sareb has 39 billion euros, of which 30% is real estate. They have more than 270 repossessed plot of land on the Costa Blanca.
3. Haya Real Estate: Haya Real Estate is the portal of Bankia. Bankia is the result of a merger of six smaller banks. They have more than 200 repossessed plot of land listed for the Costa Blanca.
4. Servihabitat: Servihabitat is the portal from “la Caixa Bank”. CaixaBank is the leading retail bank in Spain, with the largest customer base. They have more than 180 plot of land on the Costa Blanca.

 

Find more plot of land from bank repossessions on our exhaustive table of all the Spanish bank web portals at the end of this article.

 

Another good place to check is the official Spanish State portal for auctions (in Spanish)

From time to time, the Spanish State has to sell properties to recoup taxes or other, you have a list of properties per region:

The official Spanish State portal for auctions

 

Our full updated list of the Spanish bank real estate portals with bank repossessions

Move with right or left arrows to see all the data of this table

 

If you want you can find those Spanish bank real estate web portals on our web page regrouping all the real estate websites of the Spanish banks.

 

Last but not least, if you are about to buy in Spain, read our two very useful articles:

The cost of buying a property in Spain: What is the real cost of buying your Spanish Property?

 

The cost of owning a property in Spain: What is the real cost of owning your Spanish property?

 

Remember, the risks are higher if you buy a bank property from a bank. In Spain, furthermore, we would always advise you to work with a lawyer when you buy a property. He will make sure everything is fine. We developed privileged relationships with local lawyers very active with foreigners, Find your property lawyer or tax adviser anywhere in Spain

 

Before buying in any region, have a quick look at all our research on the top 20 Spanish Cities: Everything you ever wanted to know about the top 20 Spanish Cities real estate markets

 

Looking for an expert in Spain: Lawyer, Architect, Property Hunter, Mortgage? Ask us directly!

Stéphane

Senior Analyst and Strategist at HTBIS

Check the full HTBIS team here