Only in the month of March there was a rise of 26.3% compared to March 2021, up to 55,065 operations

MADRID, 17 May. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The first quarter of the year closed with the registration of 164,299 housing purchases in the property registries, an increase of 14.1% over the previous quarter, according to the real estate registry statistics of the College of Registrars.

In this way, in new housing 32,316 sales were registered, 13.2% more than the previous quarter, while used housing accounted for 131,983 operations, which represented a quarterly increase of 14.3%.

In the accumulated of the last twelve months, almost 600,000 home sales were registered, the highest figure since the third quarter of 2008, while only in the month of March there was a rise of 26.3% compared to March 2021, until the 55,065 operations.

Regarding the average price of housing, the statistics of the registrars also show significant increases in both the quarterly and interannual results. Thus, the 1,911 euros per square meter (euros/m2) in the first quarter represented an increase of 3.1% compared to the previous quarter, where the growth in used housing was 3.5% and in new housing 1 .6%.

The annualized results reflect a more structural behavior, with a year-on-year increase of 5.3%, up to 1,856 euros/m2 of average price, caused by the greater strength of used housing, with 6.8%, while housing new registered an increase of 1.4%.

By autonomous communities, in the first quarter, the highest average prices were located in the Balearic Islands (3,132 euros/m2), Madrid (3,003 euros/m2), the Basque Country (2,890 euros/m2) and Catalonia (2,391 euros/m2). On the opposite side are Extremadura (786 euros/m2) and Castilla la Mancha (849 euros/m2), the only communities below one thousand euros.

Foreign demand has continued to recover levels after the restrictions on international mobility during the pandemic and in the first quarter it reached 13.2%, accumulating five consecutive quarters of growth.

The British again lead the results, with 12%, followed by Germans (9.5%), French (7.1%), Moroccans (5.8%), Swedes (5.8%) and Belgians (5 .7%).

By autonomous communities, foreign sales were concentrated in the Balearic Islands (35.4%), the Canary Islands (26.9%), the Valencian Community (25.5%), Murcia (19.4%), Andalusia (15.1% ) and Catalonia (12.8%).

The sale of housing is broken down into 81% of collective housing (flats) and 19% of single-family housing, after the historical maximum of 22.5% in the fourth quarter of 2020. As for the annualized accumulated data, the weight of single-family homes stands at 19.9%.

As for the average area, it stood at 100.8 square meters (m2), which represents a reduction of 0.7% compared to the previous quarter. The maximum in the historical series for the housing complex occurred in the first quarter of 2021, when 102.9 m2 were reached.