Skyline Newsletter June 2023
Municipal & Regional election results
It has been, maybe for some surprising, perhaps for others not so surprising, that there was almost a landslide victory for the PP party (Partido Popular) in most municipal and regional elections last month.
They either won the majority vote, or with the right wing Vox party, formed a coalition to govern many areas, including Socialist strongholds such as Seville and Valencia.
As an immediate reaction to this disappointing news, the current ruling government (PSOE party) brought forward the November general elections to next month to fall on July 23rd July in the hope to somehow turn these results around.
Will it work, or will we similar results again in the national elections? We wait with baited breath!
Tourism and Tourist homes in Spain
The tourism sector will once again reach cruising speed this summer after the impact of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020. In 2019, the arrival of foreign tourists to Spain reached 83.5 million visitors, this year’s expectations are to reach 80.7 million and 83.7 million by 2024. Three years in which the sector has been recovering activity after the closure of borders or travel restrictions.
“Tourism will be the main catalyst for economic growth in Spain,” according to estimates from the latest ING report on the Spanish economy, with data from the National Statistics Institute (INE).
The rental of tourist homes has also benefited from the recovery of the international market in Spain, the offer of active advertisements in the first quarter of 2023 on the main tourist apartment management portals such as Airbnb, Vrbo (Expedia) or Rentalia, it is practically equal to that of the same period of 2019, with more than 314,000 ads with at least a night reserved or available during the past quarter, just 0.8% below.
The recovery of the tourist rental market in Spain compared to the pre-pandemic period is among the best in Southern Europe, if we compare it with the current offer available in Italy, with more than 352,500 active advertisements (-12.9% for the same periods), or Portugal, with almost 83,850 ads (-1.6%), with reference to the supply of active ads for entire homes between January and March 2023 (post-pandemic) compared to that of the first quarter of 2019 (pre-pandemic).
However, many town halls are already clamping down on tourist homes/apartments due to the rapid growth of these properties in the short term rental market, with the corresponding declines seen in the long term rental market, as per our report last month due to restrictive rental laws in certain areas. Some cities, which are highly popular with international tourists, such as Cadiz and Barcelona are restricting or even disallowing tourist apartment licences as a result.
Joke of the month
I bought a pair of jeans from a shop in London Bridge, they keep falling down!