At the end of 2023, the total volume of Russians’ search requests for housing in Sochi, Kaliningrad, Anapa, Crimea and Vladivostok amounted to more than 2.4 million. This is 88% higher than the number of requests for real estate abroad – in Dubai, Turkey, Thailand, Egypt and the Maldives. Sochi became the leader among Russian resorts, ahead of its closest competitor, Kaliningrad, by 17.8%.
Analysts from FIVE, a property developer, identified the leaders of 2023 based on search requests by Russians. According to the results of the study, the most popular Russian real estate locations searched were Sochi, Kaliningrad and Anapa. Sochi real estate became the absolute leader with 686,800 requests, surpassing Kaliningrad (563,980) by 122,820 requests. In third place, with 561,520 requests, is Anapa real estate, followed by Crimean lots (380,128). And the top five is completed by Vladivostok (289,148).
In addition, locations that did not make it into the top showed interesting dynamics. There were 272,185 people interested in buying real estate in Gelendzhik, Pyatigorsk was mentioned in 160,113 requests, and Kaspiysk in 84,896. Among the resort destinations that Russians gave the least preference were Derbent (57,343) and Baikal (576).
Five’s commercial director Elena Kabesheva: “The impulsive purchases that took place in 2022 have been replaced by rational ones. Customers have become more cautious, and their purchasing motives have become more balanced, unlike in 2022, when, due to external factors, purchasing decisions were made on the fly.
As for foreign locations, Russians were much less interested in them. The total volume of requests for real estate of the leaders of foreign resort areas – Dubai, the Maldives, Turkey, Thailand and Egypt – amounted to 295,834 clicks, which is 88% lower compared to the total amount of the five leading Russian resorts.
Compared to 2022, demand for domestic destinations increased by 12% relative to foreign destinations. Thus, the gap between the total number of searches for Russian real estate and foreign ones was 1.9 million. Despite the high interest in domestic locations, in 2022 the audience did not cease to be interested in foreign properties. In 2023, the difference between the indicators increased and amounted to about 2.2 million requests. This is due to a significant decrease in interest in foreign units with stable values of domestic directions.
However, Turkey was the most popular destination in 2023, collecting 159,172 searches over the past year. Second place was taken by the Dubai facilities, which were searched by Russians 113,334 times. Next comes Egypt (15,281) and Thailand (7,162). According to the analysis, the least attractive property was in the Maldives with 885 search requests in total.
Elena Kabesheva, commercial director of FIVE, a property developer: “It is easy to see that the attractiveness and tourist potential of Russian resorts in 2023 was growing by looking at the statistics of search requests. Even remote locations that are still not very popular among domestic tourists - Kaspiysk and Derbent, Baikal and Pyatigorsk - receive their share of attention and tourist flow. People are literally discovering new directions and opportunities. This interest, combined with a shortage of places to accommodate tourists, should in the future lead to an increase in investment in these territories, but for now investors are choosing the cities that are most developed in terms of resort facilities – Sochi, Kaliningrad. The study highlights that domestic leisure and travel fashion has become a long-term trend, strengthening and expanding opportunities for future investment.”
Evelina Sverchinska, marketing manager of the AVANGARDINVESTPROEKT Investment Company, a specialised property development company: “The 2023 tourist season in the Kaliningrad region showed record figures. Thus, about 2 million tourists visited the region, and traffic at Khrabrovo airport for the first time in history exceeded 4 million passengers. In addition, there is a tendency to re-visit our destination. And this is thanks to the moderately warm Baltic Sea with sandy beaches, which are superior to Mediterranean resorts in a number of quality characteristics, hotels with a high level of service, a rich gastronomic map and much more. The growth in interest in real estate, as well as the share of purchases among nonresidents, according to our company, is 60%. This indicates that the region attracts people not only as a resort, but also as a potential place of residence. We expect that further growth in interest in the location will be about 12-17%, both in the resort towns of the coast (Svetlogorsk, Zelenogradsk) and in the eastern direction (Sovetsk, Gusev).”
Requests from Russians about locations for New Year holidays and winter holidays have become interesting. In the period from 15 December 2023 to 15 January 2024, weekends in Moscow were searched more than 279,459 times, in Sochi 31,075 times, in St. Petersburg 45,588 times, and in Kaliningrad 19,275 times. Vacations in Pyatigorsk (5,268), Dombay (2,518) and Arkhyz (2,026) aroused significantly less interest among the audience.
Among foreign destinations, Russians were interested in Turkey (14,481), Dubai (13,427), and Thailand (13,255). The Maldives had the smallest number of search requests – 1,719.