Hi Jackie,

I am a market analyst who undertakes due diligence on overseas investments and have been doing a lot of work recently on Germany. The country is different from other countries because it is still very distinctive between east and west.The former East Germany including Berlin is very risky and similar to emerging markets in Eastern Europe. My clients who are looking at Germany normally stick with capital cities but I advised them not to go to Berlin because there is no significant corporate market there just government, tourism, art etc and no significant financial services sector which is what they they should be aiming for. This is one of the reasons Goldman Sachs has just pulled out from a number of investments there - they haven't been getting the yields they envisaged.

I advised them to go to Frankfurt. The value on offer, in what is one of the worlds financial centres, is phenomenal. Prices are equivalent to mid-1990s because they haven't moved in ten years, so there is enormous potential. You can pick up a fully-let one-bedroom apartment close to the European Central Bank for under €100k. Frankfurt is also the home to over 300 other banks, has more lawyers per head than anywhere else in Germany and has the highest earnings per head of any city in Europe. Targeting tenants employed in the corporate financial services should always be a priority for a safer investment.

Angela Merkel is opening up home ownership to help cover Germany's pension bill and is doing what Thatcher did in the UK twenty years or so ago. It is very low-risk compared to a lot of other overseas investments.

The underlying economic fundamentals should always stack before any overseas property investment is purchased and you should always be able to sell to the local market. If you need anymore please let me know. If have some good contacts over there so if you need them please let me know

Be aware you still lose you first-time buyer status if you purchase abroad.


Geordie