In 2004, Brian Layton, then 61, and buoyed by the prospect of selling his Hampshire water cooler business, set out on a search to find a second home in the sun for himself and his extended family.
Brian & Debbie - buying a second home in Algarve
The following is a condensed version of comments made by John Tranmer, Managing Director of AlmaVerde Village & Spa at the SB10 regional conference on Sustainable Building held at the Hilton, Vilamoura on 17 – 19 March, during the Plenary Session VII Financing and procurement.
John Tranmer
The following notes were originally prepared for a panel entitled “The Challenges and Rewards of Sustainable Development” at the OPPLive! Property Show at London’s ExCeL on 23rd October, 2009, chaired by Gordon Miller of www.whatgreenhome.com.
Here are some commonly used definitions:
Sustainability, in a broad sense, is the capacity to endure. In ecology, the word describes how biological systems remain diverse and productive over time. For humans it is the potential for long-term maintenance of wellbeing, which in turn depends on the wellbeing of the natural world and the responsible use of natural resources.
One thing is clear: the desire to own an overseas property is as strong as ever. Statistics of people browsing overseas property websites are on the up, and, with the demise of “emerging markets”, interest in the Algarve, as a safe, well-established market with a strong tourism infrastructure and planning controls, is greater than ever. However, over the past year, with the financial crisis and sterling languishing against the euro, actual buyers have been thin on the ground.
Event date: 19 -20 September
In past years, the market for Algarve leisure real estate has been propelled by the British and Irish, but the recent demise of sterling and the plight of the Irish economy have prompted developers to start looking in other directions.
Scandinavians have not been buying Algarve property in numbers, but there is anecdotal evidence that they are now becoming more active. There are now flights to Faro on Norwegian Air Shuttle from the capital cities of Oslo, Stockholm and Copenhagen, and Scandinavian currencies have remained relatively firm against the euro.