Overseas Property Investment: Economy
Investors in overseas property will be interested in the economic performance within an individual country or within a geographical area. As a whole, the global economy has shown an average annual growth of 5% for 4 consecutive years, although this has been higher in emerging and developing markets. In many areas, overseas property is an essential part of a country's success and property investment overseas offers an excellent investment vehicle.
Overseas Property Investment: Tourist Potential
A further consideration when making an overseas property investment is the tourist industry and global tourism offers some spectacular statistics. According to the World Travel and Tourism Council, travel and tourism throughout the world was expected to account for a massive 10.4% of global GDP in 2007, accounting for US$7 trillion. This figure is expected to almost double over the next 10 years. Many countries are experiencing a boom in off-plan development to cope with demand from tourism, making property investment overseas a wise choice.
As well as perennial favourites for holiday destinations such as Spain, the USA and France, there are also numerous emerging tourist markets - often the driving force behind overseas property investment. Examples of fast-growing tourist markets include many central European destinations such as Bulgaria, Romania and Slovakia. Brazil in South America and Malaysia and Thailand in Asia are also experiencing large increases in visitor numbers. World-class events such as the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi (Black Sea Russia) and the Euro 2012 football championships hosted by Poland and Ukraine, are important boosts for tourism and by extension, for overseas property investment.
Overseas Property Investment: Property Market
According to Datamonitor, between them the British and Irish own more than 3.8 million homes in foreign markets and ownership of property overseas generally is set to double over the next 5 years. And with the global property market forecast to grow annually at 13% until 2012, the future potential for overseas real estate as an investment vehicle is immense. Key growth markets are currently found in Central and Eastern European countries (Baltic States, Bulgaria and Slovakia, for example) and Brazil.
