Puerto Portals Mallorca
There is no doubt in my lifetime here in Spain the internet has revolutionized the way International Real Estate in Spain is sold forever. The bigger companies who didn’t embrace change have lost ground on their competitors that they will never get back so why has the internet had such a huge impact on Spanish property sales and so relatively quickly?
First things first let’s look at my Spanish story. When I came to Spain in 2002 I was able to do so because of two fantastic inventions created by my good friends Stellios and Bill, the power behind Microsoft and Easyjet. At this stage we were just beginning to see the huge power of the internet and for me Email channeled through Microsoft software allowed me to run my business anywhere in the world. Easyjet also made it more affordable for me to get back to the UK for meetings or visiting family. It was also pretty clear at this time that the internet would play a huge part in international business and not just real estate. However it wasn’t until Spanish Hot Properties website was created in 2007 that it became clear to me what Google was looking for in relations to its users. The reality was quite a simple one in that content is King with Google and everything else is secondary.
This is why in 2007 Real Estate companies that had been number one of search terms such as Spanish property for sale were suddenly being taken off the first page by property portals such as Kyero. The reason for this is a property portal gives Google everything it thinks it wants for its users such as huge amounts of content, 100,000 properties and access to over 1000 property agents in Spain. Whilst this is a great starting point in using the internet to empower you and proves the old adage that knowledge is power this doesn’t tell you everything you need to know. The international property buyer buying in a new country may also want to get the help of local experts such as lawyers and mortgage brokers and how does a perspective buyer decide which agents to trust and which ones not to. In 2007 one of the slogans of the property portals was that it was better to buy via there site as they weren’t getting any commission from sales. What they didn’t add is that they made their money from advertising and would allow any agent to advertise on their site who paid them.
Back to how the internet has changed the way real estate in Spain is sold forever. Let’s look back to the way properties in Spain were sold before the advance of the Internet. At this time it was much more difficult as say someone living in London to protect one’s self with you either buying a property through a local agent when on holiday or replying to an advertisement in a national or local paper and finally maybe meeting an agent at an international property exhibition.
Now you can visit Spanish Hot Properties and find location guides on all the major areas, Properties from all the 250 local agents, Google maps of the town and places of where these properties are and access to help from specially chosen Mortgage brokers and Lawyers to make sure that everything goes smoothly with your property search and purchase. However the only drawback for some of the better agents on the internet is nobody knows they exist as they have no internet presence. You only have to do a search for the number one search term on Google uk, Property for sale in Spain and whilst you will find Spanish Hot Properties as that ray of sunshine at number one, most of the other sites on the first page tend to be property portals because they have the resources to maintain their first page ranking that a small agent could never keep up with. However at Spanish Hot Properties we work with all the best agents on the coast so when you deal with us you won’t be missing out on an agent you couldn’t find on the internet.
So what we know about the internet and buying property in Spain is very simple that the internet alone won’t let you find your perfect property but at least now you can do a lot of ground work and investigation before deciding which agent to use. The problem for us all is the internet especially with the advances of Facebook and Google Plus is very much a moving target and at Spanish Hot Properties were current working on out third version of the site since 2007 to help our users get the best from our site. We hope to go live with the all new site on 17 December and hope you like it.
