British demand booms for italian property

British demand is booming for Italian property, with enquiries up by almost 50 per cent.

The statistics from Gate-Away.com shows that British requests for Italian property jumped 47 per cent in 2015, as British buyers overtook US buyers to become the number one overseas investors.

Brits accounted for 16.2 per cent of requests on the site, extending their lead over the Americans to 2 percentage points.

Why the rise in interest? The trend is primarily driven by the bargains available, with over 70 per cent of enquiries related to houses priced below €250,000. Indeed, in recent months, the exchange rate betwen the weak euro and strong pound has meant that buyers can make even bigger savings on European properties in popular lifestyle destinations, such as Spain, France, Portugal and Italy.

"The British prefer a house immediately habitable right after the purchase, but they are also interested in properties to renovate," notes Simone Rossi, general manager of Gate-away.com.

Tuscany is the region with the highest number of preferences (16,80% of requests) followed by Puglia (11.64 per cent) and Abruzzo (11.47 per cent). The two regions almost rank tied for the second and third place and the latter recently gaining strong margins.

A large proportion of international buyers have also had a long standing love affair with Tuscany, adds Rossi.

The general age range of British looking to buy a home in Italy is between 35 and 45 years old with more families now looking for a second home to spend several months of the year as opposed to just a holiday home.

"As people are less tied to a fixed office address the appeal of a desk with a view and a good internet connection has brought many families to spend large portions of the year in their new home in Tuscany," she observes. "A 3-4 bedroom house with land costs between €250,000 and €450,000 euro (from £180.000 to £200,000) and this is the type of property and budget that most British are looking at.

"Owning a bit of Italian history with character homes, views, accessibility to beaches, mountains and airport are the primary criteria requested."

More expensive tastes are par for the course in Puglia, with typical budgets reaching even beyond €400,000 - higher than the national average value of €302,000.