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Cote d’Azur feels the property pinch - 20 April 2009

The Cote d’Azur has long been seen as one of the most desirable places in the world to own a property – the evocative names of places such as St Tropez, Cannes, Antibes and Monte Carlo conjure up images of movie stars, huge yachts and casinos. Yet, this location that was predicted to weather the worst of the financial storms raging across the world is feeling the effects of the global recession as much as anywhere else.

Agents have reported a drop in property prices, though nowhere near as severe as in the rest of France, and a significant reduction in the numbers of foreign buyers coming to the area in search of their home overseas. A combination of the credit crunch in their own countries, combined with the strength of the Euro in the currency markets has taken property in the Cote d’Azur out of the price range of many of the buyers who are still looking to purchase, while others have withdrawn from the market altogether.

Talking to the Guardian newspaper, Jérôme Renaud, president of the local FNAIM (National Federation of Estate Agents) branch, said, "We used to see the English everywhere. Now they have practically disappeared ... Very few of them are able to buy property here. Many of them tell me they want to sell their second homes to secure their main homes in the UK."

It is not just UK buyers who are no longer buying in the south-east of France in the same numbers they were in recent years. The Cote d’Azur has recently become the playground of well-heeled and newly-rich Russians seeking to be associated with the glitz and glamour of the Riviera. These buyers have become tourists rather than property owners since the start of the global recession.

In fact, the rumoured sale of a £440million villa in Villefranche-sur-Mer to a Russian buyer – Mikhail Prokhorov, one of Russia’s richest men – supposedly fell through as he felt he did not want to take on the financial burden in the present climate.

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