A Look at the Property Market in 2009 in the Main Cities & Resorts of Bulgaria
Last year (2009) was the worst in the history of the fairly young Bulgarian property market. After the massive boom in prices and number of investors through from 2004 to 2007 or so, where property prices increased at between 10 and 37% a year in some areas, the first half of 2009 saw absolutely no movement in the property market and then a sharp drop in real estate prices in many of the main cities and resorts.
In Sofia, where the property market is more developed than in other areas of Bulgaria and thus more flexible, prices in Euros per square metre dropped from just above 1,000 E/sqm to under 950 E/sqm in the third quarter, and then picked up a little in the last quarter of 2009. The average price for an apartment in Sofia was 74,500 Euros in 2009, which is around 23% lower than the average prices being paid in 2008.
The property market in Varna took longer to recover with nothing moving for the first half of the year except for extremely cheap properties and some very luxurious, expensive apartments. However, due to the decrease in prices and lots of bargains around the second half of 2009 saw a good increase in property deals in Varna. Russian buyers were the main investors in property in Varna, especially of high end property but the British were also still buying, although mainly cheap rural Bulgarian houses. The average price of apartments in Varna was down around 20% on 2008.
In the ski resort of Bansko the average price of an apartment was down a whopping 40% to around 39,000 Euros, or around 650E/sqm, compared to prices of well over 1000E/sqm back in the days when Bansko was the ‘hot spot’ to buy in.
Borovets, which hasn’t suffered quite as badly from development problems and planning permission issues as Bansko and has avoided the majority of the bad press which has surrounded Bansko, saw a decrease of only around 10 to 15% in average property prices and apartments were still commanding 1,400E/sqm. However, it is hard to say how many actual apartments were sold and there was a definite lack of interest in both Borovets and Pamporovo through out 2009.
Sunny Beach saw a large decrease in property prices, on a par with the 40% decrease in Bansko. Both the summer and the winter ski resort have been plagued with reports of developers going bankrupt, agencies disappearing with clients’ money and planning permission issues. And of course a massive over supply of apartments. Prices in Golden Sands remained high for properties in unique locations while those further away from the sea saw a drop. However, again, it is hard to know the actual number of deals done, even if prices remain artificially high.
