Morocco’s Property Market Boosted by Spanish FDI

Despite the facts that Spain and Morocco are only separated by nine miles of sea and Spain actually has a couple of enclaves on the Moroccan mainland, the Spanish and Moroccan economies, countries, governments and people have not been closely aligned in recent years. Now a softening of relations between the two nations is resulting in Morocco’s property market being boosted substantially by Spanish foreign direct investment.


Morocco’s property market has suddenly become big news as various multi million dollar property development projects, which are mainly backed or financed by GCC based companies, are getting underway across the country and attracting international investor and buyer interest and the Spanish are aware of the potential that they could access in Morocco.

Conversely and at the same time it has become apparent to both the public and private sector in Spain that the wealth of local Spanish opportunity for development and profit has already been substantially exploited and for the best chances of sustainable profit they will have to look elsewhere. These factors mean that Morocco has suddenly come into the scope of the Spanish.

At the moment Spain lags well behind France in terms of the FDI (foreign direct investment) that it ploughs into Morocco annually, according to Spain’s economy and trade adviser in Rabat the Spanish have plans to turn this around and become one of the largest direct investors in Morocco over the coming years.

Their planned period of increased investment ties in perfectly with the planned expansion of the Moroccan tourism industry which is on target to expand by four million between now and 2010. As the numbers of tourists attracted to the country increases so the demand for accommodation increases and the number of hotel and resort developments in the planning stages or underway in Morocco are testament to this fact.

One of the first Spanish construction firms to announce their direct commitment to Moroccan foreign direct investment is Fadesa; earlier this year Fadesa revealed their detailed plans for a three hundred million Euro tourism and residential property development in Marrakech and they are just the first in on the trend. Already other developers and investors have shown their firm commitment to a range of property and business based projects in Morocco such as the expansion of the port in Rabat and the creation of a free trade zone in Tangier and this expansion of interest and commitment from the Spanish in Morocco bodes well for a long term future partnership.

Source amberlamb