Tunis Real Estate Question

[nidzz]

Not to critique the FT but this is the house and home (ie lifestyle) section not the economics section.

I think you can trust the Financial Times to check their facts in all section before printing. I would trust it more than the North Africa Journal.

All those interviewed where somehow employed in the property sector sheep are not going to vote for eid are they? It would have been nice to see Tunisian economist in there or a university professor.

The journalist who wrote the article has no stakes in Tunisia’s real estate sector besides the numbers speak for themselves.

I see what you are getting at but again wages from owning a business are still income you can say that about a few places but I am speaking overall also Carthage is just one place but you can find 1,000,000 dinar houses in all areas of Tunis.

The wage statistics you use to do your calculation don't include income from owning a business. If you want to make money in Tunisia the best is to be a business owner or work in les profession liberales like independent doctors. Good luck getting statistics for these people as they won’t usually declare their full income but they do earn a lot and are by far the richest people in Tunisia. And the places you mention (menzah, MVille, Carthage, and lac) are where the richest people in Tunisia live of course it will be hard for someone with wage(salary) to buy there.

You cannot dismiss a point of view based on reason with a remark like Tunis is not london.

I could say the same about you comparing tunisia with the subprime mess in the us and uk. I don’t think we should compare London and Tunis as they have very different real estate markets that was my point.

I still maintain that 5%-10% is a good rental yield 8% + for a investor to be excited.

that means that 1,000,000 dinar house in menza, nasr, MVille, Carthage needs to rent out for over 4,000 dinars a month.

That flat in lac 280,000 1200 a month (which is at the limit but not too bad).

Rent is just one indicator of the value of a house and you still have to factor in the culture which in Tunisia pushes people to buy houses even if renting might be cheaper in the long run. The government has also been encouraging people to buy houses rather than rent. All this explains the low rent yield.

ummm they are doing this anyway the cast is being destroyed as we speak with badly built developments as are the city centers of the main towns. For every beautiful building that tounsi or Kari posts there is more monstrocities that we do not see. Though they are selling them (or trying to for a lot of money).

Quality makes the price, not the price makes itself.

What you are saying is unfortunately true but if they don’t manage to sell these monstrosities It will be because they are… monstrosities not because there is something wrong with the Tunisian real estate market. Tunisia has been building as many buildings as possible in recent years and they will need time to shift gears and focus more on quality but I do see some improvements when looking at TSC for example.

Just before everyone relaxes and thinks we in Tunisia got of lightly in this recession quite a lot of people think we are going to have a two stage recession and this next stage will impact the mahgreb countries more than the first since we may get deflation (prices going down) or inflation (prices going up with high oil and interest rates) either of these scenarios kill real estate short to medium term.

Tunisia has had a dip in growth (because of manufacturing and export nothing to do with real estate) and we are on the way out http://af.reuters.com/article/invest...58G0IO20090917 the sources you provide are from the spring when it was fashionable to be pessimist, since then the world and Tunisia’s economy are getting better.

Eidek mabrouk!

[KrisAziz]

You still not providing me with anything that persuades me since unfortunately "lots of rich people" is not going to cut it with me.

Is the economy doing well so that property is going to rise more... same if not a little worse.

Are foriegners gagging for foreign property at the moment.... no

since then the world and Tunisia’s economy are getting better.

If you say so personaly i just looks to me that rich coutries are just going into debt and spending it trying to "stimulate" their economies the gold price and VIX tell you that many feel this is risky and maybe will result in inflation. outside Tunisia we are all worried as hell.

Personally I will be extatic if Tunisia gets through this unaffected.

It would be good if Tunisia had some form of real estate survey/transaction information that way we could really see what is going on.

Thanks for the posts though I really enjoy seeing peoples point of view on this.

[nidzz]

Originally Posted by KrisAziz

You still not providing me with anything that persuades me since unfortunately "lots of rich people" is not going to cut it with me.

Is the economy doing well so that property is going to rise more... same if not a little worse.

Are foriegners gagging for foreign property at the moment.... no

since then the world and Tunisia’s economy are getting better.

If you say so personaly i just looks to me that rich coutries are just going into debt and spending it trying to "stimulate" their economies the gold price and VIX tell you that many feel this is risky and maybe will result in inflation. outside Tunisia we are all worried as hell.

Personally I will be extatic if Tunisia gets through this unaffected.

It would be good if Tunisia had some form of real estate survey/transaction information that way we could really see what is going on.

Thanks for the posts though I really enjoy seeing peoples point of view on this.

I'm not going to argue with you whether the world economy is getting better or not. But for me 3-3.5 growth in 2009 and more if the world economy gets better are very good numbers for Tunisia. Tunisia would have had 6 percent this year if it was not for the global crisis so it is not unscratched from the crisis but it doing much better than other.

From your post I can see you believe there are no reasons for foreigners to pay the prices on the Tunisian market well here are a few reason:
- It's no secret that location is very important in the price of a house. Well Tunisia is fortunate to have 1300km of Mediterranean coastline(that is more than Algeria) and in case you haven't noticed the Mediterranean coast is one of the best places in the world to own property and there is a shortage of land around the Mediterranean in every country with an open real estate market. For me there is no question that land on the coast is precious in Tunisia and worth the price with 40% of the country a desert and most of the pressure is on the coast.
- Nice climate: yes the Mediterranean climate is very nice and most people find it pleasant. But that's not the only advantage just ask some of the people who own property in miami how much they pay for insurance against hurricanes.
- health care: I think this is one of our best advantages. There is a huge number old/retired people who want to get property in a hot climate country. If you are old you will want to live in a country which offers top notch health care it's a matter of life and death. Well in Tunisia we have great health care people from all over the world come to Tunisia to get health care the British NHS sends people to Tunisia to get their operations. Even the Japanese are investing in Tunisia's health care http://www.imtjonline.com/news/?EntryId82=157571
- great infrastructure not just talking about roads and airports I'm also talking leisure infrastructure (marinas,golfs, casinos etc...)
- closeness to Europe: Tunisia is 2hours from the major European cities you can spend your weekend in Tunisia that is not the case if you buy some property in a remote island where you need 7 hrs just to get there.
- cheap cost of living Tunis is one of the cheapest cities in the world. According to Mercer Tunis comes at 133 our 143 cities surveyed worldwide in 2008
(http://media.ft.com/cms/cbc3d7ca-599...0077b07658.pdf) everyone wants to live in a cheap city and will spend more to buy the property if they can recoup their costs with cheaper cost of living.
- low crime and stability
- touristic country in Tunisia we have a variety of landscape from desert, beaches, forests, roman ruins, arab medinas, and colonial towns lot to do and see in Tunisia

This list is not exhaustive I am sure there are more reason. It is good to have a dissenting view from time to time but whether you believe it or not the Tunisian real estate market is rock solid and a house in Tunisia has a lot of value.

[umyuk55660m]

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[Emasozz]

interesting

[KrisAziz]

Hi All,

Everyone still think real estate in Tunisia is going up since this thread there has been a revolution, even worse economic crisis and the economy inside Tunisia is getting worse and worse which is pretty much like most other countries.

I was looking for an office in Tunis the other month loads of empty offices and apartments but the prices are still high some even asking xx,xxx fc + a high rent.

Not saying I was right in this thread but all the projects have mostly been paused and I dont see much chance of this property boom going on and on now many of the banks have issues themselves.

- low crime and stability

Contrary to some points of view on this forum the economy in Tunisia was evidently so bad that the Tunisian people decided to have a revolution long term god willing this will improve things but short and medium term your not ging to buy an expensive house when there is another election soon and life is not 100 percent settled.

I would actually say that Tunisia's property prices are holding the economy back in some cases.

Probably the only place that looks logical is the USA or maybe Dubai now they have gone through the necessary reductions in prices.

France is even starting to fall apparently a bit outside top parts of Paris so maybe this will effect Tunisian real estate.

[KrisAziz]

Just come back from Tunisia and real estate seems to be the only game in town.

Business for most people seems to be worse however the number of times i am told a house is better than a business is really worrying a good business should always be better than a nice house as one provides a living.

Prices seem to be going up in dinars but going up less then the dinar has gone down so it looks like inflation is the governments way of dealing with things.

Surely the poor wont have to bail out the economy with inflation to save 20,000+ empty properties in Tunis and the banks that lent on them?

[manunagar]

Hmm. Description. Low. Don. "t .