You have some spare money and you want to invest it. You have already considered all the opportunities in finance but you have decided this is definitely not the right moment to give your money, your precious savings, to someone who, probably, with some magic trick, will make it disappear.
So, eventually, you come up with the idea of invest your money in bricks, a solid, touchable, real, good old house.

This is really a great idea, but where to buy it?

Well, you realize that probably your country has not the best property market at the moment and you start to consider to buy a property overseas.

Overseas properties are good investments but the question is still unanswered: where to buy?

After you have taken into consideration the whole world you realize that you would like to invest your money somewhere offering history, culture, sun as you would like to enjoy and to use your investment and, why not, you’d like to rent out the property when you can’t use it to help you pay off the investment.
But you want also to invest in a stable property market (well, as much stable as it can be in this utterly unstable moment) and reach the conclusion that Europe suits your needs.

Great, but again, where exactly to buy a property in Europe?

Europe has been hit by the crisis as much hard as all the rest of the world with banks closed down and the ones still open not giving money to anyone.

The average property price in European countries have dropped between 5% and 10% (source: Nomisma). Property prices in UK, for instance, have dropped of over 14% so far and is expected to fall to 16% at the beginning of the year compared to the start of 2008, in Spain property prices had started dropping even before this financial crisis started.

So you start to get information about property markets in Europe and you find out that there is a country where the bank system has hold the crisis, a country definitely not lacking of history, culture, sun and where you would love to go there to enjoy your investment and that would be very easy to rent out your property: this country is Italy!

Italy is in a lot better situation than the other countries, the bank system has hold the financial tsunami and not a single bank has been recorded to be gone bankrupt. This s not only due to the tight method to distribute mortgages that Italian banks have always adopted but it’s mainly due to the good habit of the Italians of not get into debit. The average debit value of Italians has increased in the last years but still doesn’t reach 50% of the available income whereas in the rest of Europe is about 100% with peaks in the UK of 160% (source: Nomisma).

Property prices in Italy haven’t drastically dropped and experts say that the prices will hold but still in this tough period you could easily find a really good deal from some seller who needs to sell his house quickly and this can only make Italy even more attractive for property investors.

Now you know the answer, buying a property in Italy is the best choice if you want to invest in a home overseas and this without even mentioning the climate, the food, the landscape and that you would love to use your investment to enjoy your holidays.