Property auctions decreased in 2017

10 January, Milano Finanza

There have been over 234,340 initiated foreclosure procedures in 2017 in Italy on a yearly basis (for a total value of auctioned properties of 30.26 billion euro), decreasing by 12.4% compared to the 267,323 foreclosures of 2016. The numbers come from the yearly report by Astasy, in collaboration with Associazione Tsei. Mirko Frigerio, Astasy president, stresses how this fall has to be interpreted “taking into account the uncertainty due to the lack of activity from the legal side, that brought many courts to postpone the publication of new auctions”, as well as the introduction of the new portal dedicated to public auctions, whose function is still not very clear.

Returning to the numbers, Frigerio clarifies that 44% of the total auctions is located in northern Italy, and that 53% is concentrated in five regions: Lombardy is first with 19%, followed by Sicily (12%), Veneto (8%), Puglia (7%), and Piedmont (7%). For what concerns provinces, ten cities represent nearly 30% of the total property foreclosures. These are Bergamo, Brescia, Catania, Cosenza Milan, Palermo, Rome, Taranto, Turin, and Trapani. All these cities present some anomalies, such the excess of access to credit, the disproportioned construction activity, and the building permits granted without really considering the actual needs of the territory.

Over 70% of the auctioned properties are of the residential type, while only 4% is represented by shops and offices that, even summed to the 7% of depots and laboratories, constitute only a small part of the total foreclosures. An important share is represented by land, with 13%.  They include agricultural lands, some of them also located in the wine regions of Italy, as well as developable land, even though this category has no longer the commercial appeal as in the past. Little less than 1% of the auctioned properties are represented by hotels, mostly cases small family-run properties. Finally, the remaining 6% is given by the “other” category that includes castles, oratories, churches, night-clubs, campsites, barracks, cheese factories, and much more,

As usual, 91% of the foreclosures are represented by small tickets, namely loans granted upon the nominal value of the assets put as guarantee below 250 thousand euro. More in detail, 78% of the units have auction prices below 139 thousand euro, while only 13% of the remainder exceed 250 thousand euro. Finally, only 9% is above 250 thousand. In conclusion, Frigerio stresses how” the trend of small auctioned properties is confirmed once again, featuring mainly two-room apartments, the typical first house of the Italian families”.

Another important fact to consider is the length of judicial auctions. Taking into account that these generally last one year with no certainty of the success of the auction sale, Astasy has calculated that the auctions closed in 2016 were only 36,858, equal to 14% of the auctions advised in the same year (267,323). Not only. Going back in the years, Astasy found that at the end of 2017 there were still 50,160 auctioned properties lying in courts since over one year, with the oldest ones dated back to 1975.

Source: Milano Finanza

Translator: Cristina Ambrosi

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