The five Alicante towns where foreign buyers now outnumber Spanish ones nine to one

In the past year, a pattern has emerged in the Alicante province of Spain where foreign buyers have increasingly outnumbered Spanish buyers in property sales. In the town of San Miguel de Salinas, only 49 of the 528 homes sold went to a Spanish buyer, with several neighboring towns in the Vega Baja region also experiencing similar trends.

Notary records reveal that five municipalities within the Vega Baja area have seen more than 80% of home sales go to foreign buyers. This includes San Miguel de Salinas at 90%, Rojales at 88.3%, Algorfa at 87.2%, Benijófar at 82.6%, and San Fulgencio at 82.1%. The pattern extends to larger coastal municipalities like Orihuela and Torrevieja, where foreign buyers accounted for 79% and 78.1% of sales respectively.

Benidorm stands out as an exception, with only 38% of home purchases going to non-Spanish buyers. The average price paid by foreign buyers was €224,192, compared to €143,296 for Spanish buyers. Notably, around 40% of the sellers in these transactions were also foreign nationals, indicating an international reshuffling of property ownership rather than a straightforward transfer from Spanish owners to newcomers.