Enquanto a espiral do preço das casas no Reino Unido
continua a descer, este artigo do FT é uma peça de propaganda para garantir que
a espiral especulativa em Lisboa continue a crescer …
Preços comportáveis para os habitante e residentes Locais, os chamados “autóctenes” !?
€400,000 A one-bedroom pied-à-terre apartment in the central
district of Chiado
€800,000 A three-bedroom apartment with a terrace in Bairro
Alto
Para alugar : T3 a 2.000 euros por mês
OVOODOCORVO
Lisbon’s ‘golden visa’ age: residency scheme boosts homes
market
The city is attracting more buyers from abroad, just as
housing reforms have aided developers
11 HOURS AGO by: Hugo Cox
Twenty years ago, Lisbon’s housing market was stagnant.
Long-standing rent controls gave landlords little flexibility to increase rent
or remove tenants. As such, there was little incentive for landlords to spend
money on their buildings, says José Salazar Rodrigues, one of Lisbon’s leading
commercial agents. Throughout the city, blocks were neglected and façades were
a decaying mess of poorly kept stonework and peeling paint. The planning
approvals process was a morass of red tape; developers could easily wait for
six years before being granted a permit to develop a building.
Following his election in 2007 — and despite his socialist
credentials — Lisbon’s mayor António Costa began a process of deregulation. The
city’s draconian rent controls were moderated and the painful bureaucracy of
permits was streamlined. “A new tax regime was introduced, including a cut to
sales tax and a big reduction on VAT for new developments,” says Patrick
Dewerbe, a tax partner at local law firm CMS Rui Pena & Arnaut.
Costa is now Portugal’s prime minister and his socialist
government is welcoming foreigners to the country’s property market. The
“golden visa” programme, introduced in 2012, has meant that as Lisbon has
become more attractive to developers, it has also become more appealing to
buyers from abroad.
The scheme grants residency to anyone who spends at least
€500,000 on property. Once granted, recipients must spend at least a week in
the country for the first year and a total of two weeks every two years
thereafter — a small sacrifice for unencumbered travel throughout much of
Europe. Government data show that more than €1bn has been invested in property
via the golden visa scheme in the past year and almost €3bn since its launch.
Interest from abroad has helped boost prices. Average sale
prices in Lisbon gained 6 per cent in the year to April, and 16 per cent in the
past three years, according to Savills. Despite these gains, homes in the city
remain a very affordable €1,350 per sq metre.
The high concentration of historic buildings in central
Lisbon has helped too. The city’s strict planning code has long protected these
from the wrecking ball, meaning that most new prime developments are top-to-toe
restorations, from complete internal refits to the resurrection of tired
façades.
Six-bedroom, detached villa in Lapa, €3.5m
In the city’s Alfama neighbourhood, Athena Advisers is
selling a three-bedroom apartment with a garden and a good view of the Tagus
river for €1.9m. The property is in the Santa Helena development on Largo do
Sequeira, where the original buildings date back to the 16th century. In Lapa,
a well-appointed western district home to several embassies, Fine & Country
is selling a detached, six-bedroom villa for €3.5m.
There are also alluring options outside the city. Besides
the plentiful supply of fancy beach resorts nearby, such as Estoril and Cascais
— nicknamed “cash-cash” by the pupils at local international schools — which
are stocked with sprawling top-end villas, there is also plenty to keep golfers
entertained. Belas Clube de Campo, half an hour’s drive inland from Lisbon, is
a purpose-built development of villas and townhouses, including a championship
golf course and a swanky clubhouse. Andre Jordan Group is selling a
three-bedroom villa there for €995,000.
Three-bedroom villa at Belas Clube de Campo, €995,000
Government figures show a market that until recently was
dominated by Chinese buyers: almost four out of five visas under the scheme
have gone to Chinese. Between 2013 and 2015 frenetic buying distorted prices.
“They were so desperate for the golden visa that they would pay €500,000 for
homes worth half that,” says Rodrigues.
Today, however, the biggest demand is from Turkey, says
Charles Roberts of Fine & Country. He estimates that Turkish nationals
account for two-thirds of current golden visa applications. Smarting under the
effects of an increasingly autocratic political regime and a run of terrorist
attacks at home, they are keen to get money out of the country.
Tax breaks compound the appeal of the golden visa. Under
Portugal’s “non-habitual resident” scheme, second-home owners from abroad who
spend 183 days or more in the country per year may get considerable tax perks.
These include, for the first 10 years, exemption from any tax on
foreign-sourced pensions, dividends or employment income. For many foreign
retirees and entrepreneurs, this means the majority of their income is tax
free.
For rich buyers this is a compelling prospect. Roberts
recently sold a house in Estoril for €4m to a retired Swedish executive. The
buyer had worked around the world, had senior management positions in a host of
international companies and collected an impressive portfolio of pensions. “I
asked him how much [moving to Portugal] meant he saved from Sweden’s tough
income tax regime. It was enough to pay for the house in four years,” he says.
Buying guide
● Foreign buyers can typically get local mortgages for about
half the value of their home, according to agents
● Buying costs — including sales taxes, land registry and
stamp duty — are about 7 per cent. An annual 0.3 per cent is charged on the
home’s ratable value
● Regular flights connect London with Lisbon in roughly two
hours, 40 minutes
What you can buy for . . .
€400,000 A one-bedroom pied-à-terre apartment in the central
district of Chiado
€800,000 A three-bedroom apartment with a terrace in Bairro
Alto
€2m A five-bedroom villa with pool and garden near the
seafront in Estoril
More homes at propertylistings.ft.com
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