Real estate investments are booming in Spain and Europe, as investors are exiting riskier investment avenues in favor of safer options. According to sources from the real estate world, the interest in these instruments has grown 400% since November, with people purchasing homes without even having set foot in them. Some are even using crypto as a payment method.
Real Estate in, Crypto and Stocks out in Spain
The real estate market has been growing since last year in Spain and Europe, due to the rising inflation costs and war, which has changed the predictions some had about an economic recovery. According to numbers from Europa Press, the interest in the real estate market has increased by 400% since November, with many investors running toward buying properties without even having seen them.
Some investors have even taken funds from other investments considered riskier, like stocks and cryptocurrencies, to take refuge in the properties market. Rebeca Pérez, founder and CEO of Inviertis, a company that allows users to invest in rented properties in Spain, gave its take on what is happening in the real estate market. She stated:
[Investors] are withdrawing everything they had on the stock market and are investing in real estate to preserve their assets, a situation that has worsened since the Russian military invasion of Ukraine.
Crypto Investments Reevaluated
Pérez believes that crypto and stock investors value real estate properties as a more stable investment that offers less fluctuation than stock or crypto markets, and also gives them the opportunity of getting in and out of the market easily due to the high demand.
This high interest has also driven some crypto investors to purchase properties directly with cryptocurrencies, not having to exchange them for fiat money using banks. This can be pretty attractive to some investors, according to Perez. She explained:
You turn a risky investment into a conservative one and, if you were lucky enough to enter the crypto world in 2012, for example, you can buy a house for 200 euros back then.
However, there are still hurdles that need to be simplified when doing this kind of transaction with cryptocurrencies. These include the calculation of the taxes associated with the purchase and setting the price in bitcoin or another cryptocurrency due to their volatility.
These operations are much more common in Latam, where several properties have already been sold for crypto, and there is a more general acceptance of the assets as payment methods.
What do you think about the real estate boom and its relation with crypto in Spain? Tell us in the comments section below.