Tag: cataluña

Anticipa: House Prices in Madrid & Barcelona Return to their Peaks of the Real Estate Boom

11 November 2018 – El Confidencial

The (real estate) recovery is really heating up. House prices in Madrid are on the verge of returning to their peaks of 2007. What seemed impossible, is now becoming a reality. That is according to a report from Anticipa Real Estate, which forecasts two-digit increases in house prices in the Spanish capital this year and next. Specifically, it predicts that homes will become more expensive by 10.2% in 2018 and by 11.5% in 2019, rises that are twice as high as the percentages that experts consider to be sustainable.

House prices have already been growing at rates of 10% during the last two quarters, according to the Repeated Sales House Price Index, prepared in accordance with the Case & Shiller methodology from the United States applied to Spain, which analyses repeat sales of the same homes. In other words, they are rising at double-digit percentages reminiscent of those recorded at the height of the real estate boom a decade ago.

Despite that, both property developers and banks are insisting that the market is very different to the one seen more than ten years ago and they categorically rule out that we are facing a similar situation to then. On the one hand, access to financing remains very restricted for solvent clients, whilst the recovery in prices is very uneven across the country. Whilst in the cities (and in certain neighbourhoods), prices are skyrocketing, in others, prices are still decreasing.

Although on average, by the end of 2019, house prices in Spain will be 15% below the peaks recorded in 2007, according to the report from Anticipa Real Estate, there are some hot spot areas where those prices have already been exceeded. In Cataluña, another of the hot spots in the Spanish market, increases of around 9% are expected next year and that despite the delicate political situation in Cataluña, which has had a direct negative impact on the real estate market – in Barcelona -, which, until a year ago, was performing extremely well in terms of transactions and prices.

Madrid stands out from the rest of Spain, with an evolution in terms of residential prices that has caused the first alarm bells to start sounding. In certain neighbourhoods, such as Chamartín, Chamberí and Salamanca, second-hand homes now cost the same as they did ten or twelve years ago, whilst in others such as Arganzuela, Centro, Moncloa and Tetúan, prices are close to exceeding those levels. In others, where prices are still well below their peaks of the bubble, the market is rising at rates of 20%, rapidly reducing the gap with respect to 2008.

They are peripheral areas of the city towards which price rises are moving like an oil slick. And that is because prices, both to the purchase and rental markets in the centre of the city have reached such prohibitive levels that much of the demand is moving en masse to more affordable areas, resulting in significant upward pressure on prices.

According to the latest data from Tinsa, in Vicálvaro, Ciudad Lineal and Villaverde, house prices have risen by more than 20% in the last year, compared with rises of 8.5% in Chamartín and 13% in the district of Salamanca. Meanwhile, the municipalities of Barcelona, such as L’Hospitalet de Llobregat, Castelldefels, Esplugues de Llobregat and Sabadell, are experiencing a similar phenonemon with increases of more than 15% (…).

Original story: El Confidencial (by E. Sanz)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Juan Velayos: “Spain Needs to Create a Large Rental Player”

22 October 2018 – Eje Prime

Neinor Homes is going to reach “cruising speed” in 2019. The listed property developer is working to close the year with the delivery of almost 1,000 homes, half the number planned for next year. In the growth plan for the real estate company for the next few years, its CEO, Juan Velayos, does not rule out selling entire developments to a large rental home manager, a type of player that “Spain needs to create”, assured the director at a breakfast meeting held yesterday in Barcelona.

Velayos recognises that, for the time being, there are not any real estate companies specialising in rental “with such a large volume that would allow them to offer us an attractive margin, but we would be delighted to negotiate with any of them”.

The possibility of expanding its portfolio of clients through agreements with large asset managers could prove attractive for one of the property developers with the largest land bank in Spain and which forecasts starting to hand over 4,000 homes per year from 2020 onwards.

In total, the listed company has buildable land on which to construct 13,500 homes spread over 180 developments all over the country. The external valuation of this portfolio amounts to €1.813 billion, according to sources at Neinor.

“The company has already started to hand over homes and generate a positive cash flow and result”, highlights Velayos. The property developer currently has cranes at sixty developments, which will introduce 5,000 homes onto the market. Following the latest purchases of land in Bilbao, Sevilla and Madrid, “we have the land bank covered until 2021”, confirms the director.

In financial terms, Neinor recorded revenues of €78.9 million during the six months to June. That figure reflects a lot of activity in the marketing area. As at 30 September, the property developer had pre-sold 3,000 of the 7,000 homes that it had on the market, resulting in revenues of more than €1 billion for the company controlled by the Israeli fund Adar Capital.

“We will reach cruising speed in 2019”.  

Velayos trusts that the increase in productivity this year will allow Neinor to reach “cruising speed in 2019”. Next year, the listed company will have more than 120 developments underway, with a percentage of pre-sales that already exceeds 75%.

On this roadmap to lead the Spanish residential segment, Neinor trusts “wholeheartedly” in Cataluña, confirmed Velayos. It represents the firm’s current “star” location, as proven by the fact that 50% of the 5,000 homes that the property developer currently has under construction in Spain are located in this region and, primarily, in the metropolitan area of Barcelona.

“We are working on quite a few operations in the first ring”, said the director. In terms of the profile of the property developer’s buyers in Cataluña, young couples stand out, accounting for 39% of its customers, ahead of families with children (33%). In this sense, it is worth noting that 15% of its clients are investors, a percentage that exceeds Neinor’s average at the national level (11%).

Regarding the moratorium that Ada Colau is planning to launch in Barcelona, and which will oblige 30% of all new developments to be reserved for social housing, Velayos is clear: “That measure will not affect us because we won’t buy land in Barcelona” (…).

Original story: Eje Prime (by Jabier Izquierdo)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Núñez i Navarro Invests €25M in Site of Former Metalarte Factory to Build 80 Homes

19 October 2018 – Eje Prime

Núñez i Navarro has not forgotten about its land on the site of the former Metalarte factory. The property developer chaired by Josep Lluís Núñez is going to invest €25 million in the construction of a residential development in the Barcelona municipality of Sant Joan Despí.

The company is planning to build eighty homes, in total, with parking spaces and storerooms in the same property, which will be constructed between this autumn and 2021. 61 of the homes in the development will be private, whilst eleven will be social housing units and seven will be granted to the Town Hall of Sant Joan Despí by the Catalan company.

Núñez i Navarro acquired the former Metalarte factory in 2001. Almost twenty years later, the property developer is recovering the land to build its second residential project in the Barcelonan municipality. The company has just carried out a comprehensive renovation of the farmhouse where the Trias de Bes family used to spend its summer holidays to convert it into a school.

At the moment, the Núñez i Navarro group has twenty-three projects underway, corresponding to an investment of €250 million in Cataluña. Barcelona, Sabadell, L’Hospitalet de Llobregat and Sant Joan Despí are the cities chosen by this unlisted property developer to build 947 homes, two hotels, a co-working centre and 69 commercial premises or offices.

In fact, the company is one of the firms in the sector that has best overcome the crisis, with its low debt policy. Proof of that is the investment effort that it has undertaken in the Catalan region over the last five years, where it has disbursed almost €400 million.

Original story: Eje Prime 

Translation: Carmel Drake

Aedas Homes has a Landbank Covering 4+ years of Visibility

8 October 2018 – Nasdaq

Aedas Homes, a leading property developer in the new real estate cycle in Spain, already has enough land in its portfolio to cover deliveries until 2022, as well as a significant part of 2023, thereby confirming the delivery targets set out in its IPO prospectus. The company’s landbank (close to 90% is classified as ready-to-build) will allow it to develop up to 14,521 homes in Spain’s key residential markets and is considered by analysts to be the best in the country.

So far in 2018, the publicly traded company, with CEO David Martínez at the helm, has completed the construction of 222 homes scheduled for delivery this year, 190 of which have already been sold.  As of August 31, the company had 6,287 active units, 55% more than in December 2017, and of those, 1,623 were already under construction. These figures reflect the strength of the property developer’s operating capacity during its first year.

In 2019, the developer plans to deliver almost five times as many homes, with a delivery target of 1,055 residential units; 1,071 homes are currently under construction and 761 have been sold. In 2020, Aedas Homes will deliver 1,986 homes and reach its cruising speed in terms of launches (3,000). The plan for 2021 is to deliver 2,438 homes and begin 2,471 new projects. 2022 will mark the moment when the developer reaches its cruising speed in terms of deliveries, with plans to put 3,063 homes in the hands of customers and launch another 3,000. In 2023, the number of homes being delivered will reach 3,326.

Martínez highlighted the company’s strict compliance with the goals announced at its IPO, noting that the company returned a profit one year ahead of schedule. Specifically, the property developer earned €3.7 million during the first half of 2018, making it the first of the new large developers in Spain to become profitable, and doing so only eight months after being listed on the Madrid stock market.

“We designed a realistic business plan, meaning that we will reach our targets in the coming years: by 2020, for example, we will have delivered more than 3,200 homes. Right now, we have almost 6,300 active units across 117 developments which gives us the visibility we need in terms of our objectives,” Martínez explained.

About Aedas Homes

The property developer Aedas Homes became a listed company on 20 October 2017 in Madrid, with a market capitalization of over €1.5 billion. Aedas is an industry leader at the national level and aims to play an important role in the new cycle of the Spanish real estate sector, which must be marked by professionalism and an adherence to rigorous standards.

Aedas Homes has a fully permitted residential landbank with more than 1.5 million buildable square metres (the highest quality landbank in Spain, according to analysts). This will permit the development of 14,500 residential units in the key markets, and their surrounding areas (both in terms of real estate and finance) where Aedas operates: the Centre, Cataluña, the East & Mallorca, Andalucía and the Costa del Sol.

Original story: Nasdaq 

Edited by: Carmel Drake

Forcadell: 486,946 m2 of Logistics Space Leased in Cataluña in First 9 Months

10 October 2018 – Eje Prime

The Catalan logistics sector is seeing its figures soar. With three months still to go before the end of the year, the industrial segment of the real estate sector has already exceeded the total volume of space leased in all of 2017, with 486,946 m2 leased during the first nine months of 2018, according to data from the real estate consultancy Forcadell.

The report from the Catalan consultant points out that during the third quarter of 2018, 99,557 m2 of logistics space was leased, up by 28% YoY. That figure means that the leasing volume to date exceeds the figure recorded by Forcadell at the end of last year (459,451 m2).

The second ring of Barcelona is leading the increase in the Catalan logistics sector, accounting for 47% of the operations signed during the third quarter.  In total, seven operations were registered in this area between June and September, with 50,341 m2 of industrial land leased.

The second ring was followed by the first ring, which accounted for 40% of operations and a total leasing volume of 43,216 m2. The third, with some plots located in the province of Tarragona, accounted for 13% of the transactions in this market in Cataluña.

The Director of Industrial and Logistics at Forcadell, Gerard Plana, said that “new construction projects are continuing to offset the lack of available supply”. Seven of the fifteen operations that were completed during the third quarter in Cataluña involved new build or turnkey assets.

In terms of the largest operations signed during that period, they included Henkel’s new 24,000 m2 warehouse in Montornès del Vallès and the 10,520 m2 warehouse that Mercadona leased from Goodman in Barcelona’s Zona Franca area.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake

Criteria Raises the Price of the Plots for Hard Rock Café Complex in Tarragona

8 October 2018 – El Confidencial

Criteria, the holding company of the investment companies owned by La Caixa, has increased the price of the plots on which Hard Rock Café Entertainment World is set to be built. The new leisure and casino complex is due to be constructed in Tarragona, next to Port Aventura. That is according to explanations provided by sources in the real estate sector to justify the delay in the project, formerly BCN World, which constitutes the largest foreign investment pending in Cataluña and which will involve the disbursement of €2 billion in total.

Criteria had closed an option to sell the land worth €110 million. But that was in December 2014. Now that Hard Rock Café, a multinational from the United States of America specialising in hotel and restaurant complexes linked to casinos, wants to exercise the option, Criteria is claiming that the real estate market has recovered in the last four years and so the price needs to be updated.

Sources at Criteria declined to comment but other sources in the real estate sector explained that a new due diligence process is being carried out to determine the magnitude of the price increase. The new price is expected to amount to around €140 million, a claim that has been rejected wholeheartedly by the Hard Rock Café, which alleges, and rightly so, that the delays incurred by the project (…) which now amount to more than three years, cannot be attributed to the company.

According to the original plan, the project should have been ready by 2015. But, partly due to the withdrawal of investments, and partly due to the political instability in Cataluña, the complex has suffered various delays.

Hard Rock Café is the only company that survived the bidding process for the gambling licences and is now the main party responsible for developing the complex. The forecast investment in Tarragona amounts to €2 billion for the construction of Hard Rock Entertainment World, which will have two hotels and 1,100 rooms, a shopping area with 75 shops – which will be operated by the British giant Value Retail, owner of Las Rozas and La Roca – and a 10,000 m2 casino. The project is expected to create more than 11,000 jobs and will be carried out in phases: the first amounting to €600 million.

When the initial investor withdrew, which was led by the businessman Enrique Bañuelos, La Generalitat subrogated the option to purchase the land, as a way of ensuring the continuity of the project. But that operation is neutral. La Generalitat would only perform a transfer and the final investor would have to pay the price of the plots. The Administration does not want to assume the surcharge that the new valuation would now result in.

Different positions

Each party defends its position. For Hard Rock Café, it cannot make its company or the other investors responsible for the delays incurred and therefore, does not want to assume the additional cost.

Meanwhile, Criteria has renewed the sale option, which had a term of 18 months, on up to four occasions to ensure that the investment would not go to waste, and considers that its efforts should also be rewarded.

An agreement must be reached between the parties soon (…). This project is key for Cataluña and will only serve to turn around the foreign investment figures that have been negative for the Catalan Administration since the independence process entered its critical phase.

Licence in May

In May 2018, Hard Rock Café obtained the licence for the project, which includes the gambling licence for the casino, granted by La Generalitat. That administrative permit arrived a year late due to the political instability in Cataluña. Now, Hard Rock Café, which is owned by a tribe of Seminole Indians (Florida) has three years to submit its plans. La Generalitat expects the building work to begin in 2019. The negotiations with Criteria could mean more delays if the positions fester, warn sources in the real estate sector.

Original story: El Confidencial (by Marcos Lamelas)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Aedas Puts 142 More Homes Up For Sale in its Largest Development in Sevilla

7 September 2018 – Eje Prime

Aedas Homes is starting its second round of sales in Sevilla. The property developer has just released 142 new properties on the market, located in the 1,046-unit residential complex that the company is building in the Andalucían capital.

After finding buyers for 70% of the 142 homes that comprise the first building, Aedas has now placed the properties from the second block on the market. The residential assets have a surface area of 80 m2 each on average and are on the market for, approximately, €122,800.

These 100-odd homes form part of the largest housing development that has ever been built in Spain. The large residential project, which is called Jardines Hacienda Rosario, will house 1,046 apartments distributed over seven blocks and will have more than 33,000 m2 of common areas.

Aedas Homes is continuing its commitment to Andalucía, but it is also present in other parts of the country. Currently, the company has a portfolio of buildable land amounting to more than 1.5 million m2. With that surface area, the company has the capacity to build almost 14,00 homes in the six areas of the country in which it operates: Centro, Andalucía, Costa del Sol, Cataluña, Levante and the Balearic Islands.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake

Uro Properties Sells 14 Santander Branches for €29.5M

6 September 2018 – Eje Prime

Uro Properties is doing business with Lerma Investments. The Socimi, one of the investment vehicles that owns some of Santander’s branches, has sold fourteen of the financial institution’s branches to the company Lerma Investments for €29.5 million, according to a statement filed by the group with the Alternative Investment Market (MAB).

The assets are currently leased to Banco Santander for an average period of 21 years. Following this sale, Uro Properties will have liquidity of €44 million. Moreover, the Socimi will continue to own a portfolio of bank branches with a market value of more than €1.88 billion.

Uro Properties debuted on the MAB in March 2015 at a price of €100 per share and with a market value of almost €260 million. Three years later, its market capitalisation amounts to €206.9 million. The reference shareholders in the company are the firm Ziloti Holdings and Banco Santander itself, which owns 15% of the share capital directly.

Currently, the Socimi’s portfolio comprises 712 properties, which occupy a surface area of more than 330,000 m2. More than half of those assets are located in Madrid, Cataluña and Andalucía.

Original story: Eje Prime 

Translation: Carmel Drake

Servihabitat: Spain’s Housing Market Continues on its Positive Trajectory

24 July 2018 – Eje Prime

The housing market in Spain is going to continue with positive figures across all areas in 2018. That is according to a report from Servihabitat, which indicates that prices are going to continue to rise this year, up by 5.4%; operations are going to soar, with a leap of 24%; and new build starts are going to rise by 16.6% (all figures compared to last year).

According to the report, these increases respond to a residential market that “is progressing with clear signs of consolidation”, which is explained by factors such as an improvement in consumer confidence, the containment of unemployment and the positive evolution of companies’ turnover.

These elements “are encouraging the start of housing projects and configuring an expansive cycle”. With a special focus on the largest populations in Spain, such as Madrid, Barcelona, Málaga, Valencia and Sevilla, in the case of homes for regular use, and on regions such as Galicia, La Rioja, the Community of Valencia and the Canary Islands, the number of new home starts will rise by 16.6% this year to 93,895 units.

Meanwhile, the number of finished homes will rise by 15.5% during the course of this year, according to Servihabitat’s forecasts, with a total of 63,744 homes delivered. Despite that, the pull of demand will reduce the new build stock by 4% to 454,939 homes, with a greater reserve in the communities of Cataluña, the Community of Valencia and Andalucía (the three account for 49% of the total stock).

The second major increase will be seen in the number of transactions, in other words, the sale of homes signed at the notaries’ offices. According to the report, the year will close with a total of 669,739 transactions subscribed, up by 24.3% compared to 2017.

Macroeconomic conditions, together with opening up of the financial sector to the granting of mortgages and demand for property investment (thanks to the returns that the rental market is offering) are the three main drivers of demand, which have reduced the average sales period for a normal home to 6.6 months.

Finally, the evolution of supply and demand will lead to a rise in house prices once again this year, up by 5.4%, compared with an increase of 6.2% with respect to the previous year.

Prices are expected to grow by the most in the Community of Madrid, with a forecast increase of 11.5%; followed by Cataluña, 9.6%; the Balearic Islands, 8%; and País Vasco, with an expected increase of 5.2%. By contrast, prices are forecast to rise by less than 1% in the autonomous regions of Extremadura and Castilla-La Mancha in 2018.

The report also reflects the opinions of the real estate agents who form part of Servihabitat’s own network of branches and its collaborating agents. In particular, 64.2% of that sample believes that the price of regular homes (primary residences) will remain stable in 2018, compared with 33.2% who think that they will rise and just 2.6% who consider that prices will fall. In the case of holiday homes, the dispersion is somewhat greater: 34% forecast that prices will rise this year; 62.6% think they will remain stable and 3.4% believe that they will fall.

Original story: Eje Prime (by C. de Angelis)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Solvia: House Prices Are Expected to Rise by 6.1% in 2018

11 July 2018 – Eje Prime

All of the indicators are remaining positive in the Spanish residential sector. At least, that is the conclusion of the market trend report that Solvia has prepared. Banco Sabadell’s servicer forecasts a 6.1% increase in average house prices and a 7.2% increase in the number of house sales during 2018.

The report Solvia Market View indicates that, since 2013, house sale operations between individuals have grown by 140%. That figure exemplifies the dynamism of transactions in a market that is very much in recovery.

Sabadell’s servicer highlights that the residential real estate brokerage business generates turnover of €1.2 billion. That sector, which is still “very fragmented, will tend towards a concentration into large platforms with a high number of available homes”, says Solvia.

The report forecasts that the volume of transactions will exceed 570,000 this year, 74% of which will involve operations between individuals, “a trend that will continue over the coming years”, according to the servicer.

Prices: 10% higher in Cataluña

In terms of average prices, some areas of the country are expected to grow significantly. Cataluña looks set to see house prices rise by 10.5%, whilst in Madrid, that percentage is forecast to amount to 7.1%. Outside of the large capitals, the Balearic and Canary Islands are forecast to register price increases of 8.9% this year, according to the report from Solvia.

Meanwhile, Andalucía, the Community of Valencia and Murcia are expected to see price rises of 5.4%, somewhat below the national average, of 6.1%.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake