A few months (8 months) ago we wrote in this article about an encounter we had with a Russian lady buyer of ours, who bought a beach property in Larnaca against our advice (because of the high price) and turned against us. and she said that “You don’t know the value for us Russians who live 10 months of the year in the cold, what this village means…”. We thought, at that time, “She must be very rich to say this, but what matters to us is telling her the opposite”. After 8 months of this meeting we have other experiences to tell you, that after all, it seems that she may be absolutely right.
– 2 months ago a beach plot in Limassol was sold for £700,000 pd (20% building density), the highest price ever achieved for a beach property in Cyprus (£25,000,000) when the current rate was £500,000 pd The buyer contacted us and we said “you must be crazy” to buy this at this price. After 2 months he called us back to say ‘I’m not as crazy as you think because now I have an offer of £1,000,000 pd'”.
– Land on Dhekelia road with prevailing rate of £300,000 pd (max) 3 months ago, sold last month for £450,000 pd! (£3,600,000).
– Land in Paphos with no access and no water supply (purely speculative land) but situated within a development zone full of ancient monuments, on the beach sold for £250,000 pd – An unbelievable price.
– Land in Mazotos not on the beach but close to potential golf course sold for £250,000 pd (last year maxed out at £100,000 pd).
– Land in the Paralimni beach area is now selling (with numerous buyers) for £500,000 pd (last year £350,000 pd).
– Land at Alaminos 220d was sold for £440,000 pd (£97,000,000) at a rate in effect last year of £250,000 pd
– Etcetera etcetera
Why do you think prices have skyrocketed at such an alarming rate and, of course, so high? We think mainly because the “Russians are buying” in an increasing volume in terms of land/beach properties.
As Russians get richer due to rising oil and gas prices, a new generation of much richer Russian buyers appears. The paranoia of the Russians buying “us” from us is the talk of the town nowadays.
Beach houses for apartments have fetched an average of £3,000-6,000 per square meter and for beach houses £7,000-10,000/m2. Incredible as it sounds, a developer called us from the Paralimni area to say that he has 5 villas to sell at £600,000/unit (not a popular market in Russia). We sold all 5 in 10 days, 4 of which to locals and one to a British guy. This same project had 15 beach apartments with an average price of £3,500/m2, which were sold in 15 days to a buyer (??) for £4,500,000!! What is quite interesting is the current price of luxury houses in Limassol. The fee is now £7.0 million. for a house of about 800 m2. and on land of around 2,000-3,000 m2. not on the beach. Lest you think that it is an isolated situation, we had a client with an unlimited budget (so we declared it) and we were embarrassed to show him houses north of the beach (about 1 km) that were not worth more than €2,000. We did and he bought one immediately at the asking price of £3.5 million! Word has spread and anyone with a house to sell, either with a large plot of land and the size of the aforementioned unit, wants a £7.0m price tag!
This could be thought of as a beach situation and for individual cases and why should we bother. But on the other hand, such sales have a knock-on effect on non-beach land. So in Limassol again we have prices off the coastal road at £400,000 pd and in the Protaras area £280,000 pd The land in Tersefanou near the prospective golf course, which was for sale at £150,000 pd last year, now Selling at £250,000ft (not on golf course but close to it).
We, as we claim to be real estate experts, have lost track of what is going on and are no longer trying to predict. However, what worries us are the strict new financial measures introduced by the Central Bank that require a 40% participation of the buyers in terms of a % on the total sale price or the valuation prepared by an independent appraiser (which be less). We expect this to affect the pace of demand and prices, but on the other hand people who buy at this higher end and at those exorbitant prices, we doubt they will be affected. Recently an apartment building in Limassol, not on the beach but close to it, either of a premium design (not yet built) is selling for £150,000 for a one bedroom apartment and 30% has already gone! sold out! We may have told you about a client of ours who owns a plot of 135 m2. beach house in Protaras who bought it for £170,000 4 years ago and had a local knocking on his door offering £700,000 (not even a Russian). He asked us for advice and we told him, do it, if you can find something similar to yours on the beach (he couldn’t). Imagine if this buyer was Russian. We feel like we sometimes live in the UK at Maple Arch or Kolonaki in Athens. You have seen the movie “The Russians are coming” but let’s add, with a lot of money!!