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Edition 276
Friday 17th June 2016
HOME BUYS UP
BY ALEX TRELINSKI
S
panish home sales have increased the most since April 2008 as the nation’s economy continues to recover from the financial crisis, with the Torrevieja area one of the most popular in Spain fuelled by international buyers. Transactions increased 29 percent in April
T
compared to a year earlier according to figures from the National Statistics Institute. A separate report showed that home values increased by six point three percent in the first quarter from a year earlier, the largest gain since the third quarter of 2007. “What we are seeing is the combination of banks lend-
ing again marrying with pentup demand from buyers who are now more comfortable that the economy is really recovering and are confident prices have bottomed,” said Jose Luis Ruiz Bartolome, co-author of The Return of Bricks and Mortar, a 2015 book about the decline and recovery of Spain’s real estate and mortgage markets. Torrevieja continues to be in the vanguard of home sales, with the latest development ministry report for the first three months of 2016 suggesting that the fourteenhundred sales between January and March, were only beaten by the much larger cities of Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia and
Sevilla. Experts say that the upward trend is set to continue with not too surprisingly a major interest being shown by non-Spaniards including British and Scandinavian buyers. On the Orihuela Costa, the local council has authorised the building of 270 units in a revival of a project that was first proposed 13 years ago on the Las Filipinas urbanisation, which will see the construction of 245 homes. Orihuela council has also green-lighted the building of 24 houses at El Barranco, Los Dolses, with the authority claiming that their announcement is indicative of the upturn of the housing construction industry in the area.
HIGHWAY ROBBERY
orrevieja mayor, José Manuel Dolón is to complain to the European Union over the Madrid central government not spending anything on converting the N-332 highway around Torrevieja into a dual-carriageway, despite the fact that the project has had a budget for the last eight years. Dolón says that it has become an annual farce and charade where the central government declares that there is money for the upgrade but nothing happens. The mayor wants Brussels bosses to investigate what is going on with the funding for
the eight kilometres of work which he says should have started already, and at the very best will not be completed until 2020. The mayor says that the money has been around
since 2007, and he produced a recent letter from the country’s acting development minister, Ana Pastor, which proves that the 16 million euro project has been budgeted for. The Green Party mayor
also took a swipe at the acting Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy for visiting Torrevieja at the start of the general election campaign last Friday and having nothing to say on the stalled N-332 works.
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