Hello,

Last two weeks my friends asked me to look for him to help him buy the right flat. Since I have been doing my homework . Again, let's share some fresh experiences.

In the same street, I visited two flats. With 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, one nice living room, a place to park your car, same age ( about 27 years old ). Same Builder. One is on sale for 175 000 euros ( on sale already for the last two years), the other one at 125 000 ( and the owner is willing to negotiate something ).

Why such a big difference.

The expensive one, the owners decided that they WANT 175 000 for the flat, and they won't sale it at that price ( I bought one three years ago, completely refresh for 121 250 euros. And the market went down. Market price for that 115 000 to 135 000 ( 115 000 is a good deal, 135 000 only if the flat was rebuild inside ( new kitchen, bathrooms, paint, floor, windows etc...))

And the second owner asked prices in a few agencies to know the market value.

Now my second example. Same street, two buildings, touching each other. Same area, same view. One with garage ( at least 15 000 euros to buy a garage on that area). One for 140 000 without garage, with a very old aspect, floor, walls, kitchen.... The other one 137 000 with garage, a new kitchen, new floor, new bathroom.

So I already have some example of prices that are not fair.

So If you want to buy, and if you would like to make a good deal, get someone to help you, or spend time visiting with various agencies, owners etc...

In my blog you can find some infos, not lot yet because I only started a few weeks ago.

Take care and enjoy Portugal.

And by the way today is the celebration of the "Portuguese revolution". In 1974 Portugal was still under a Dictature.

Sebastien Lacroix
Independent Real Estate Consultant

__________________
Sebastien Lacroix
Independent Real Estate Consultant
http://real-estate-porto.blogspot.com/

Interesting to read about the market up there. I am not replying on the e mail about purchase or not? Now or later? The only thing to add to all this is that: It is never the wrong time to buy, it is just WHAT you buy and how much you pay for it. This deals you can do anytime when you have a person that really need to sell, no matter if it is up or down in any market in Europe or even on a Global market. To add other issues in like, the poor value on the Sterling, the stock market etc etc, will never end up in a good deal, to end up with a good deal you need to be very active and have the funds ready when ever you find something. Me and my collegeu is going up to the Silver coast and that tour will probably include Cascais as well. Good Luck!

Hello Stefan,

I am glad you enjoyed my post. So you are planning to "invest" in Portugal, Silver Cost. Nice area of course. I guess you already know Portugal. Where are you from? I am from france, but I have been living in Scoltland one year, Barcelona also a year and now in Portugal. As I wanted to live here I already bought a place to stay :-)
In Aveiro. Nice city, the beach is about 10 minutes from car. I started my day by a 25 minutes run in the sand and then went inside the water to try to caught some waves but they were very small lolol.

It will be nice if you keep in touch about your trip and how things went. I would love to learn from other people experiences ( good, bad) about buying here in Portugal. I am working as an Independent Real Estate Consultant, for now my clients are mostly my Portuguese network and already some international contacts, one from England, one from Sweden and the last one from Belgium. I am always happy to learn more about my job, my business area so please feel free and more than welcome to share your experience with me. If I could help in anything, I will be glad. I am fluent in Portugues ( My mum is Portuguese :-), it helps sometimes .

Take care and enjoy Portugal

__________________
Sebastien Lacroix
Independent Real Estate Consultant
http://real-estate-porto.blogspot.com/

Hi Organics1,

We have been watching the Portuguese market for 2-3 years now and it does not seem to have been moving much. Prices staying the same and the same properties on the market.
Interesting what you say about Cascais. You would think if there was a mass exodus that would affect house prices.
We are intending to visit the area with a view to looking at property. Where are the best areas to buy?
How are the flights between Lisbon and Hurghada???

Margaret

Hi Margaret,

It depends what you are looking for and for what reason (holiday, rental, permanent stay). If you are going for one of the new builds in Cascais (or anywhere else) then you will be paying a premium as with any new build.

However look around and there are deals to be had but it does take time and a lot of searching. The biggest problem I am finding is that un-like the UK where agencies are heavily regulated by the OFT, NAEA and Ombudsmen, that isn't the case here. Talking as a retired ex London agent it is now near on impossible to buy a property through your company in the UK. Again this is common practice here, well from what I have seen and heard so far. My take on it here is that once the property hits the agents web-sites or windows it's no longer a deal as either they would have bought it themselves or passed it on to one of their developer buyers. I know I shouldn't tie everyone to the same brush but I'm just talking from personal experience. The vendors basically give a price that they want and don't really care who buys it. The properties I have bought have been either through word of mouth, seeing a personal ad, through an auction or what's called "carta fechada" sealed bids. This is usually when the local council is taking the property from the owner to pay for some kind of un-paid taxes or duties. As I stated earlier this takes time and off-course trawlling through the local papers everyday which if you're only visiting you won't have time to do.

I can't really give you advice on areas as I don't know what you're looking for. I'm not an agent just an individual who likes investing in property.

I haven't even started to look at how I can get to Hurghada but will do once I secure a place. I have been there a couple of times now and so I know it reasonably well. I guess I'll probably have to fly to Morrocco and the change there or one of the other euro cities which have direct flights.

Hope this helps and let me know if I can be of any more help.

Kind regards

Organics1

Sounds like a lot of work but we have had to do the same in Egypt. Looks as though the system is pretty similar as Estate Agents are a relatively new concept in Egypt. Most properties are not even advertised, so you have to find another way into the market unless you are buying in touristic areas of course which sounds a bit like Portugal.

We were originally looking to move to Portugal to live for most of the year and have looked at various areas but never quite made it to Cascais but we intend to do so. However, given that we have just lost a villa here, I caught my hubby looking again at Portugal. The exchange rate is not really up to buying in Euroland at the moment for Brits but that's not to say that we won't still be looking to the future, say in 2-3 years. So, anything we would be looking at would be to live in and it would probably a villa with a bit of a garden and a pool.
We have seen websites for some developments south of Lisbon which looked nice and will probably visit them when we do come to Portugal again.

You can fly here via Madrid, Vienna, Brussels, Amsterdam, Frankfurt and possibly Majorca believe it or not.

Thanks for the info,
Margaret

Hi Margaret,

Oh no! did you lose the villa in El Gouna? Sorry to hear that.

In terms of Cascais, trying to find a nice detached Villa with some land, possibly pool or tennis court will set you back quite a bit. If I won the lottery I would buy a plot of land in Quinta Da Marinha (have a look at it) and build a stunning house. It's the Beverly Hills of Cascais

However my favourite area of all is Sintra. It has a great mixture of countyside, historical buildings and nearby beaches. I'm in the early stages of building a 300 sqm modern architecture house with with pool and garden (waiting for planning concent). It will be going on the market as soon as the 3D pictures are done.

Let me know when you're over as I have no problems in spending a couple of days with you showing you around the different areas.

Best Regards

Organics1

Yes, we have heard that Sintra is beautiful. We will be waiting until the pound/euro exchange rate settles before we come over.
Thanks for your kind offer and I would extend the same to you although my expertise at the moment is around Cairo. I would hope to be extending that to further south shortly.

Margaret

Hi Margaret,

A friend of mine is heavily involved in the currency markets and tells me that there is a bit of a rumour flying around at the moment regarding the Euro/Sterling exchange rate, which is that they are trying to strengthen the Euro so much against the Pound so that it becomes the 1 for 1 scenario or very close to it. That way the UK will have no excuse but to change to the Euro. I know this is just a rumour but I'm a big believer in there being no smoke without fire. So just keep a close eye on the rate.

Thanks for offer but as I have family in Cairo (Heliopolis) I know it quite well and to be honest I try and stay as far away from it as possible

Organics1

Well, that bit of information does not surprise me in the least.

I was meaning if you come to Hurhgada but you may have family there also.

Margaret