Real-estate websites have responded to figures released by the National Statistics Institute which show a 29% increase in April home sales by suggesting that the housing market is moving at different speeds.
Beatriz Toribio of the fotocasa.es site says that the revival in the market is producing zones of activity. "Economic crisis has created a two-speed market. Price and sales behaviour is very unequal." In this regard, the worst effects of the crisis have now been lifted in much of the Mediterranean region, including the Balearics, as well as in Madrid.
Toribio suggests that it is too early to say for sure that there is a recovery in the market, but she identifies factors that have been contributing to it: the renewed availability of credit, a stabilisation in prices, the gradual improvement of the economy and the profit that can be obtained from renting out properties.
At the pisos.com site, Manuel Gandarias notes that in April it wasn't only the used property market that was moving, so also were new properties. This, he suggests, is clear sign of recovery. "There has been an increase in the purchase of properties off-plan that started to be built in the middle of 2014."
He observes that political uncertainty has not been having an influence and expects that the upward trend will be reflected by May's figures. He stresses that now is a good time to buy.
Fernando Encinar of idealista.com believes that the 29% growth in April confirms the good health of the market and that it has returned to something like normality. He points out, however, that the figure is well under what it was in the strongest year of the housing bubble. The April figure is in fact 58% below what it was at the peak of the market. In this respect, he says that the growth, after years of low sales activity, is not alarming, meaning that it doesn't suggest that there is a return of the housing bubble.