As a business that specialises in selling Bulgarian property we have been concerned by the recent European and U.S sanctions imposed on Russia.
Given the high level of activity in the Bulgarian property market by Russian buyers we were concerned that these sanctions would have negative effect. We are delighted to report to that we have not seen any negative fall out to date in the number of Russian Buyers travelling to Bulgaria, however we must note that the weakening Rouble is causing many Russian Buyers to seek discounts to compensate the cost of purchase.
The charts below demonstrate the fluctuations between the Rouble and the Euro since 2009.
average Russian Buyer needs approx 7% more Roubles to buy a Bulgarian property than they did during the same period of 2013. An example of this was a recent sale of two properties in Santa Marina in Sozopol where the purchasers requested a discount to allow them to complete the purchase. The discount agreed was 8% of the asking price as they needed to factor in the loss in value of the Rouble from when they had initially started to search for a property.
Despite the weakening Rouble the real proof of the strength of the Russian commitment to Bulgarian property was demonstrated during our recent auction where we sold 17 properties, with 15 of these going to Russian Buyers.
Our next Auctions will be on August 28th and October 2nd, please contact us if you would like to discuss placing your property for sale or if you require a catalogue of the properties that will be for sale.