Italy is one of the top five destinations for British first time buyers looking to purchase abroad. A survey by foreign exchange company Moneycorp— which examines the behaviour of British first time buyers every two years— found that the credit crunch is pushing nearly half of them to buy their home overseas, rather than in the UK.
Despite the strengthening of the euro, they believe their money will go further outside Britain than at home.
Among these buyers, Italy is the fifth most popular country, after Spain, France, the USA and Australia. Although Italy’s relative popularity has gone down compared to the 2006 edition of the survey—when it ranked third—the actual number of British first-timers turning to Italian shores has increased from 12% to 17% of all those considering a foreign purchase.
This renewed attention for Italian homes among first time buyers matches a more general trend of growing British interest in Italy—another study by Moneycorp showed that British enquiries into Italian properties have grown by 24% and have widened from the traditional hotspots of Tuscany and Umbria into Le Marche, Calabria, Emilia Romagna and Abruzzo, among others.
“Less publicised areas such as Piemonte, Molise and Basilicata are also popular with those seeking an affordable entry point and a decent and realistic capital growth along with a rental yield opportunity,” states the latest edition of the company’s twice-yearly Foreign Focus Index.
What makes first-time buyers different from other British purchasers, however, is that many of them are coming to stay. According to Moneycorp, more than half the number of first-timers planning to buy abroad will treat the property as their home, rather than an investment.
