In an assessment of the past year, and despite any challenges presented, the real estate sector in Cyprus proved its resilience once again. The demand for real estate, both from local and foreign buyers, is reflected in the volume of transactions. This was also clearly presented in the data of the Department of Lands and Surveys through the comparative sales of real estate, which are received and processed on a quarterly basis. In the third quarter of 2022, a total of 5,566 transactions worth €1.65 billion were recorded compared to €1.2 billion in the second quarter and against €1.3 billion in the first quarter of the year.
During the year, demand was influenced by a number of factors, such as the war in Ukraine, the plan to attract foreign companies to Cyprus and the government’s interest rate subsidy measure, which ran until the end of 2021. All this contributed to the increase in demand for real estate from both locals and foreigners.
The increased interest from foreign buyers is due to two main factors, the arrival of people from Ukraine, Belarus and Russia after the start of the war, as well as the government’s strategy to attract foreign companies, and the incentives given to foreign buyers to transfer or establish their headquarters in Cyprus.
Since the beginning of the year, according to a report by the European Commission, 1,100 companies with more than 9,000 employees have registered through the Company Facilitation Unit of the Ministry of Energy, Commerce and Industry, companies that need to find property to relocate their offices. Companies that choose to operate in Cyprus show interest in buying or renting luxury office space and apartments.
Interrelatedly, this creates an additional demand for real estate from the employees of these companies, who, since they will now be working in Cyprus , subsequently would want to obtain housing. In the first nine months of 2022, as recorded in the data of the Land Registry and Survey, 1,040 properties have been sold nationwide to 1,287 buyers from third countries. At the same time, during the period under reference, sales documents have been filed for a total of 2,275 properties from 2,493 buyers from third countries. It is clarified that these figures relate only to buyers from third countries, because there is considerable interest also from buyers from Member States of the European Union.
There is also a high demand from the domestic market for completed and resale properties, something that is also recorded in European statistics, which rank Cyprus among the countries with the highest rates of owner-occupied housing in Europe. Based on the data of the third quarter of 2022, 1,442 transactions were made in the Nicosia district, with a total value of €363 million. Most of these transactions concerned land (485) and plots of land (430). In the Limassol district, both the total sales and their value, which reached €762 million, exceeded all other districts with the majority of sales in land (879) and plots (449).
In the district of Paphos, 876 sales with a total value of €276 million were recorded. In addition to the highest interest being in land purchases (265), there was equal interest in apartments (201) and houses (174). In Larnaca, sales amounted to 1,147 and their total value to €188 million, while in the Famagusta district, 320 transactions worth €63 million were made. In Larnaca, transactions for plots (268) and land (232) were dominant, whereas in the Famagusta district apartments (114) and houses (87) were more dominant.
