Marbella, Estepona and Benahavís registered 1,566 residential sales between them in the first quarter of 2026. That is 36.0% fewer than the quarter before and 30.2% fewer than the same quarter of 2025, on Registradores de España figures. Over the same three months the average price per square metre in Málaga Province rose 13.1% against Q1 2025, on the Tinsa IMIE index.
Those two numbers look like they belong to different markets, and the gap between them is most of what there is to understand about the Costa del Sol this year. Volume has come down hard from a genuinely exceptional run, and pricing in the Costa del Sol property market has not followed it. The reasons are visible in the same quarter’s data rather than a matter of opinion.
The Costa del Sol property market in numbers
The comparison quarter matters more than the percentage. Q4 2025 produced 2,446 sales across the three towns and Q1 2025 produced 2,243, both of them well above what the Costa del Sol property market used to turn over in three months. Measured against that, 1,566 is a sharp fall. Measured against the decade before the pandemic it is an ordinary first quarter. Which of those two sentences gets quoted usually depends on who is quoting it.
First quarters are also the weakest of the year here for reasons that have nothing to do with confidence. The buying season on the Costa del Sol runs from spring viewings to autumn completions. January to March therefore carries deals agreed in the quietest window of the year. Reading a Q1 number against a Q4 number compares the thinnest quarter with the fullest one.
What the figure does confirm is that the run of two exceptional years has ended. Anyone pricing a sale in the Costa del Sol on 2024 and 2025 transaction speed is pricing against conditions that are no longer in front of them, which is a different problem from a market in decline and needs a different answer.
The Costa del Sol property market did not fall evenly
Marbella recorded 842 sales, down 30.1% on the quarter and 27.4% on the year. Estepona recorded 598, down 43.8% on the quarter and 32.9% on the year. Benahavís recorded 126. The spread between Marbella and Estepona is the part worth sitting with, because the two towns are usually assumed to move as one within the Costa del Sol property market.
Estepona’s steeper fall is largely a new build story. The town has been delivering completed schemes in concentrated bursts, and a quarter in which several reach handover together posts a volume figure that the following quarter cannot repeat. That is a delivery calendar rather than a demand signal, and it reverses as soon as the next phase completes.
Benahavís behaves differently again because of its size. A hundred and twenty six sales in a quarter is a small enough number that two or three villa completions move the percentage, so quarterly swings there tell you very little on their own. It is one of the places where a percentage change is genuinely the wrong measure to quote.
Prices went the other way
National house prices reached record highs during the quarter, growing 14.3% annually, with Málaga Province at 13.1%. Both figures are Tinsa IMIE, measuring average price per square metre. Three years ago the same series had Spain at 4.1% and Málaga at 2.8%, so this is the third consecutive year of acceleration in the Costa del Sol property market rather than a single unusual quarter.
Falling volume alongside rising prices is normally a sign that supply is the binding constraint, and that is what the rest of the quarter’s data supports. There is no shortage of people who want to own on the Costa del Sol and there is a real shortage of finished homes in the places they want to own, particularly within walking distance of the sea.
Across the Costa del Sol that shows up as pricing that has held in prime locations while the number of deals has thinned. Well positioned homes are still finding buyers at the figures being asked. Homes that are overpriced or need serious work are sitting, and the gap between those two outcomes has widened noticeably since the middle of last year.
What the fall is measured against
Most of the argument about the Costa del Sol property market this year is really an argument about the base year. Choose Q4 2025 and the picture is a collapse. Choose Q1 2019 and the same quarter is a strong one. Neither comparison is dishonest, and which one gets used tends to reveal what the person quoting it wanted the number to prove in the first place.
The more useful reading is that the two years just gone were the anomaly. They combined post pandemic relocation, a weak euro against several buyer currencies, and a wave of off plan schemes reaching completion at once. Those three things arrived together and have now largely worked through, which is exactly what a return to normal volume looks like from the inside.
We track what is actually for sale across the agency networks on the Costa del Sol, week by week, and have done for years. Setting a quarter’s transaction data against what was standing in stock at the time is how we judge whether a slower Costa del Sol is a demand problem or a supply one. This quarter it reads as supply.
Resale is the market and new build is the shortage
Resale properties accounted for 90.3% of transactions in the quarter against 9.7% for new build. That is close to the long run composition of the Costa del Sol property market and it corrects the impression left by Q4 2025, when new build briefly reached 20.0% of sales because several developments reached handover in the same three months.
The low new build share is not weak demand for new build, it is the supply of completed units running out. Buyers who want a finished, energy efficient home with a warranty still outnumber the homes available in that description, which is why new build continues to command a premium over comparable resale stock.
For a buyer that changes where the opportunity sits. The competition is fiercest for the small number of completed new homes and considerably softer for good resale that needs updating, particularly now that Marbella has raised the threshold for licence free works to €15,000. The buyer’s guide sets out how that trade usually works out on real numbers.
Financing stopped being the obstacle
Euribor fell to 2.34% by the first quarter of 2026 and average Spanish mortgage rates to 2.99%, both continuing a decline that has run for more than a year. A buyer borrowing today is doing so on materially better terms than a buyer borrowing in early 2025, and that is one of the few inputs to this market that has moved in the buyer’s favour.
It matters less in the Costa del Sol property market than it would elsewhere, because a large share of purchases here are made without a mortgage at all. Where it does bite is at the lower end of the local market and among younger Spanish buyers, both of which have been priced out for several years and are slowly returning as monthly costs fall.
The effect on the top of the Costa del Sol property market is indirect but real, because cheaper money supports the whole chain of transactions underneath a prime sale. The speed of that chain is often what decides whether a villa buyer completes when they intended to rather than six months later.
The demand behind the numbers
Foreign buyers accounted for 34.3% of residential transactions in Málaga Province in the quarter against a Spanish national average of 13.92%, on Registradores and INE figures. More than one purchase in three on the Costa del Sol is made by someone who does not live in Spain, and that share has been climbing rather than settling.
The composition of that demand is what makes it durable. British buyers remain the largest single group nationally, followed closely by Dutch, German, Italian, French and Polish purchasers, with strong and growing interest from North America and the Gulf. No single currency or economy carries the market, which is a large part of why it does not turn as sharply as single nationality markets do.
Málaga airport handled 5.09 million passengers in the first quarter, up from roughly 4.4 million in the same quarter of 2023. Air connectivity is the single best leading indicator of second home demand on the Costa del Sol, because it decides how casually somebody in Manchester or Munich can come for a long weekend. It has grown in every one of the last three years.
Pricing into a slower Costa del Sol property market
The practical consequence of all this is that pricing has become the whole of the seller’s job again. In 2024 a wide range of asking prices found buyers because there were more buyers than homes in almost every bracket. In 2026 the range that works has narrowed, and a home priced outside it does not sell slowly, it sits.
The evidence for where that range sits is not in the asking prices on the portals, which are a record of hope rather than outcome. It is in what comparable homes actually completed at, which is why we keep our own record of both across the whole coast and update it every week. Ask us what a specific home is worth and you get the completions behind the figure.
For anyone selling in the Golden Mile, Estepona or the villa districts above the town, the useful exercise now is a realistic valuation against this quarter’s completions rather than last year’s. Our valuation calculator is the quick version and the seller’s guide covers the rest. For buyers, the current listings are the place to see how far the range has moved.
What the quarter does not support is the reading that the Costa del Sol property market has turned. Fewer sales at higher prices, with foreign demand rising, financing improving and air connectivity at a record, is a market working through an unusual two years rather than one losing its footing. We will publish the second quarter picture the same way, with the figures and their sources attached.
How many properties sold on the Costa del Sol in Q1 2026?
Marbella, Estepona and Benahavís recorded 1,566 residential transactions between them in the first quarter of 2026, on Registradores de España figures. That is 36.0% down on Q4 2025 and 30.2% down on Q1 2025, measured against two exceptionally strong years.
Are Costa del Sol property prices falling in 2026?
No. Average prices per square metre in Málaga Province rose 13.1% in the year to Q1 2026 on the Tinsa IMIE index, with Spain as a whole at 14.3%. Transaction volume fell while pricing reached record levels, which is what a supply constrained market looks like.
Why are there fewer sales but higher prices in the Costa del Sol property market?
Because the constraint in the Costa del Sol property market is supply rather than demand. There are fewer finished homes for sale in the places buyers want, particularly near the sea, so the deals that do happen clear at strong figures while the total number of deals falls.
Is now a good time to buy in Marbella or Estepona?
It is a better time to negotiate in the Costa del Sol property market than either of the last two years, especially on resale that needs updating, and financing has improved with Euribor at 2.34%. Competition is still sharp for completed new build. Tell us the budget and the brief and we will show you which side of that line your money goes furthest on.
Where do these Costa del Sol property market figures come from?
Transaction volumes are Registradores de España, price growth is the Tinsa IMIE index, foreign buyer share is Registradores and INE, and passenger numbers are AENA. Every Costa del Sol property market figure here traces to one of them. They are the same sources behind our quarterly market report, one source per claim.
The Costa del Sol property market continues to evolve, but informed decisions begin with reliable data. Download the JUST Q1 2026 Marbella Property Market Report today and gain exclusive insight into one of Europe’s most resilient and internationally driven residential markets.
DOWNLOAD OUR Q1 2026 MARKET REPORT NOW
Research enquiries:
James Evans — Managing Partner
📞 +34 643 390 376 | ✉️ james@justrealestate.es
Sales enquiries:
Alina Nouaimeh — Partner
📞 +34 600 689 749 | ✉️ alina@justrealestate.es
FAQ
Is the JUST Market Report free to download?
Yes. The report is available as a complimentary download and provides professional analysis of the Marbella, Estepona and Benahávis property markets.
Who is the report designed for?
The report is written for buyers, sellers, investors, developers, relocation clients, family offices and anyone seeking accurate, data-led insight into the Costa del Sol property market.
Where does the data come from?
Our analysis uses official information from Registradores de España, INE, Notariado, Tinsa, Banco de España and other recognised industry sources, combined with our own market observations and research.
How often is the report updated?
JUST Real Estate publishes a comprehensive market report every quarter, ensuring readers have access to the latest available market intelligence.
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