I have had a property (real estate) web site for over seven years now and have watched the big swings in the Spanish market with both a personal and more professional interest. The Property Sales Spain buyers are certainly much thinner on the ground now when you compare it with five years ago, but they are still there! So how should you set a price on your villa or apartment?

The first and most important thing to do is to talk to local (and I do mean local not a national one) property agents, as they should know their market, they know what is actually selling and for what sort of price. There is no point you telling them what sales price you want if it is totally unrealistic. I know plenty of estate agents that will not even take a property onto their books now unless a sensible and realistic price can be agreed. The answer most often quoted to that is "I have seen one like my villa for x euros", but then did it sell, almost certainly not. Look in many real estate agents shop windows and you will see lots of photos of apartments that have very obviously been their for years. So from the property agents point of view, why would their best salesmen take a rare potential buyer to visit your property if it is well overpriced, they want to earn wages or commission, so they will tend to concentrate on the best priced properties on their books.

Research prices on the internet as well, if you see something alike to yours, contact the owners or the agent and ask how long it has up for sale. I always choose to ignore printed real estate price lists and company brochures, they are always out of date, plus the real bargains are always sold well before they can get on to it.

Then once you have settled on a reasonable property value, visit all the local estate agents and put it on as many of their books as is possible, but do not sign sole agent contracts. This brings me to another important point, get loads of keys cut, at least enough for a set for every agent. This is very, very important as salesmen may only have a few hours with a potential buyer, so they will not want to spend half time that trying to get keys from you, they will take them to visit the villas to which they already have all the keys.

Property agents charges can certainly vary a great deal, but what does it really matter how much they charge if they sell your apartment or villa? In my own personal experience the more expensive estate agents do tend to sell more properties, but I am certain that is not always the case. To avoid this expense you could attempt to advertise property yourself, for as long as you get a good solicitor it should not be a great problem and their charges and fees will not be more than a one off flat fee of a 3 or 400 euros.

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