In a word: yes.
But before you divert all your marketing budget to target Warsaw, read on…
Turns out that – as with the Swedes – Poland’s super-rich are getting super-richer faster than the rest.
Knight Frank’s international residential research guru, Kate Everett-Allen called it back in March this year. Kate tells me that “in the Wealth Report we tipped it [Poland] for growth – the number of millionaires is forecast to rise 91% between 2020 and 20025, whilst UHNWIs ($30m+ in wealth) are forecast to rise by 61%.”
She adds that property prices in Poland “are rising at around 9% per annum so potentially some domestic, equity-fuelled purchases.”
So I reached out to the head of data at Spain largest property portal, Daniel del Pozo Salinas, Head of Idealista/data since 2017. Daniel says that in July 2021 they saw searches from Poland increased by 50% compared to the same period last year. Together with Sweden (+62%) and the Netherlands (+36) they are the top 3 increases of interest from foreign countries for Marbella property.
“On the other hand, UK -11% and Russians -13% are the ones that fell the most,” he reveals. “However, UK and Sweden are still the leaders with 13% and 11% of total visits respectively.”
Polish agent Agnes Marciniak-Kostrzewa, founder of Marbella real estate agency Anges Inversiones confirms that there is “very high interest and yes – they [Polish] are actually buying,” she said.
Agnes thinks that one contributing factor is the same one as those affecting many other Europeans living in colder climates: the pandemic has made many people with financial means and the ability to work remotely seek a better quality of life,
“Taxes [in Poland] are still lower compared to Spain, so they are not interested in changing their tax residency – not for now.” She adds that another factor is that the political situation in Pland is “not very good and some might be buying to have the possibility to move out if the situation there worsens.”
This article in Forbes talks about Polish the government’s proposed tax reform program dubbed “Polish Deal”, According to the government, “the ‘Polish Deal’ will lift the post-pandemic economy by lessening the tax burden on 18 million lower-paid Poles and increasing rates for top-earners… …If approved by the Parliament this fall, provisions of the program are expected to come into effect in January 2022.”
So what are they buying? I don’t have official figures for Marbella specifically, but looking at recent official data from Spain’s registrars for Q2 of this year for the next best thing, Malaga Province, the top 3 buyer nationalities were UK, Sweden and Belgium in that order.
So although Marbella, Benahavís and Estepona split is likely to be slightly different to the provincial one, it does suggest that although there is a significant rise in both interest and sales to and from Polish buyers, in actual volumes this is still not likely to be in the top 3 or top 5 any time soon.
So before you get excited and move all your advertising budgets to Poland, take a minute. That said, if you’re selling to an international market in Marbella, the Poles should be in the conversation.
So what’s the next emerging nationality for Marbella property? Word on the street is the Czech Republic. Watch this space.
If you haven’t already, watch what Agnes has to say about Polish buyers
Find out about what the budgets of Polish buyers here are and whether they speak English (ie if you’ve even got a shot at selling to them).
Watch the video here: https://youtu.be/sdOpUa_WebY
