Time to grab your dream home in Italy? Yes, absolutely!

If you are keenly hunting your own sun-kissed refuge, you ought to seize the opportunity with both hands as we expect the Italian housing market to stay depressed this year, weighed down by the uncertain prospects for economic growth and by high unemployment. It will continue to decline an average of 1.8% within the end of 2013, whereas things look a bit better for 2014 with a slight price increase of about 0.2%, according to economists.

Although we can see that some timid signs of change are underway, which hopefully will bring ‘the dawn of a new market’, prices are still down. This means that whoever is thinking to buy a second home in Italy must hurry up to take advantage of this ‘favourable’ juncture. As a matter of fact, in such a contingency, the economic turbulences have triggered a chain reaction leading to the growth of the number of properties and bargains on the market, concurrently with declining selling prices and homeowners ready to mark them down. So you have the possibility to choose the home that best suits your desires among a very wide range of properties for sale at this time at very competitive prices.

According to the FIMAA (Italian Federation of Business Broker Agents) report, after 2006 when transactions peaked, from 2007 to 2013 the Italian residential real estate market drop by 22% and house sales fell steeply due to contracting household disposable incomes and strained credit supply conditions.

What does it concretely mean? The survey examines the data covering 185 seaside towns and 92 mountain and lakeside resorts. What emerges is that as for seaside areas the worst-hit region is Friuli-Venezia Giulia with prices decreased an average of 9.2% compared to the last year. In a better state are properties in Calabria (-3.4%). Friuli also ranks number one for the mountain resorts with -11.8%. On the opposite, prices for real estate in Umbria remain stable and Trentino Alto-Adige records only -0.6%. So, on the whole, the crisis hit mainly beach resorts than mountain spots, and struck indiscriminately all locations and property conditions. Nevertheless, brand new homes and low quality properties are those that record the highest decrease (-7%).

On the other side of the coin, among ten most expensive localities are some popular and mesmeric places, such as Capri and Forte dei Marmi with an average of 15,000 €/m2, Madonna di Campiglio (14,000 €/m2), Santa Margherita Ligure (13,500), Cortina d’Ampezzo and Courmayeur (12,000), Sestri Levante with 8,900 €/m2.

As for big cities, there are some places that recorded a far less prices decrease, namely Naples with -3%, Milan (-3.6%) and Genoa (-3.9%). On the contrary Verona with its -7.9% is the town where home prices have lost more value. And that’s what happens also in the suburban neighborhoods of big cities in comparison with central and semi-central areas.

In the hinterland the stronger price reduction has affected the localities in the province of Florence (-6.4%), Genoa (-6.1%) and Bari (-5.9%). The analysis by geographic areas has revealed that the rate of decline worsened in central Italy with a price decrease of 6.0%, followed by the North with -4.8% and finally the South of Italy with -4.6%.

But a property price slump may not be enough to attract non-Italian investors in the Bel Paese. That’s why government is going to undertake some important changes to ease and implement the purchase of properties in Italy, such as the reduction of taxes involved in the buying and selling process, the establishment of rules to facilitate home buyers’ access to mortgages, and financial incentives and bonuses for renovation projects and energy efficiency improvements.

Therefore, we can only say that buying your ideal home in Italy today could be your once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!