Can we still speak of a fall at this point? “It’s a collapse,” admits Christophe Duportal, chairman of the South-West Real Estate Observatory (Oiso). According to this association, which brings together 110 private developers, social landlords, communities, banks, insurers and the construction sector, sales of new homes in the Gironde fell by 53% in 2023. There were 1,403. The phenomenon is…
Can we still speak of a fall at this point? “It’s a collapse,” admits Christophe Duportal, chairman of the South-West Real Estate Observatory (Oiso). According to this association, which brings together 110 private developers, social landlords, communities, banks, insurers and the construction sector, sales of new homes in the Gironde fell by 53% in 2023. That was 1,403. The phenomenon is even more evident in the metropolis of Bordeaux. . All operators there achieved 948 sales in one year, a decrease of 59% compared to 2022, which was already part of a downward dynamic since 2018, “where everything built was sold and put into use”, according to Christophe Duportal .
This was before a “first drop in building permits”, the health crisis, the war in Ukraine and its impact on construction costs, plus the increase in interest rates for private individuals. This time the decline is clear: “In terms of the size of the activities, we are back in 2001.”
Fewer investors
In the department, 2,459 lots were offered for sale in 2023 (-20%). The decline reached 34% in the Bordeaux Métropole region, where the central city represented 25% of sales, compared to a third in previous years.
Christophe Duportal, the chairman of Oiso
Emmanuel Commissioner
Two statistics are revealing. The share of investors in the agglomeration, those who buy to rent, falls to 25% (-22 points). Another important development is the 655 “withdrawals” of sales recorded in this geographical scope in 2023, compared to 209 in 2022, which were related to the abandonment of marketing phases due to a lack of sufficient customers and prospects. In this case, construction programs may be reworked or stopped. “Recordings have always existed, but actually on the margins,” notes Christophe Duportal. There, compared to the 1,473 offered for sale, the share is “significant.”
The Oiso has a very telling indicator. “In one year, an average household in the metropolis with a child has lost up to 80,000 euros in purchasing capacity,” the annual report underlines. In other words: “more than one room less”.
Helped sales
As a result, there was a “real shift” in assisted sales in 2023, with “almost one in three homes sold in Bordeaux Métropole” (compared to 16% in 2022) thanks to mechanisms such as the social loan for rental property (PSLA ). One system is experiencing a major breakthrough: the Real Solidarity Lease (BRS), interesting “in a dense urban fabric”. Separating buildings from land enables savings “on the order of 30% to 40%.”
The Arcachon basin is holding up better. The number of mentions increased by 102% and turnover by 1%.
The increase in prices by 5% at departmental level, to an average of 5,052 euros per m², including parking, hides differences and “decreasing prices in a majority of municipalities in the metropolis, linked to sales in T3 and T4”. The building land sector is not immune to the crisis (-30% in the Gironde, or 521 plots for sale). “Today we are at production and sales levels that no longer correspond at all to the housing needs of the French,” concludes Christophe Duportal.