Apartment prices have risen by up to 70% in some areas since 2020
The starkest reality of the housing crisis
Housing in Palma de Mallorca
The impact on the average family budget for buying a home in Spain is now almost 33% higher than in 2020. Soaring prices have driven up costs over the last five years due to upward pressure from, on the one hand, insufficient supply to meet growing demand and, on the other, limited new construction. Five years ago, a typical 90-square-meter (m2) property came onto the market for just over €164,000; now it costs almost €220,000. This stark contrast reveals a significant regional disparity, with price increases exceeding 50% in several autonomous communities and even reaching 70% in some provincial capitals.
The analysis of the disparity in price increases across regions reveals the areas of greatest real estate pressure. Three autonomous communities are registering increases exceeding 50% between 2020 and 2025, according to data from pisos.com. This price surge in these areas is fueled by tourist demand, economic growth, and a scarcity of available land.
The Balearic Islands, with a 62.52% increase, leads the ranking. The archipelago, which has garnered numerous headlines due to its soaring prices, has seen the price of a typical 90 m² apartment jump from €283,825 to €461,269 since 2020. The other two autonomous communities with increases above 50%, although some distance behind the Balearic Islands, are the Community of Madrid, where the typical apartment in the study has risen by 53.45% in the last five years, from €265,915 to €408,047, and the Valencian Community, with a 51.76% increase (from €117,278 to €177,986).
On the other hand, the autonomous communities where the increases have been more moderate (less than 6%) are Extremadura (+5.12%) and Castile and León (+5.84%). The remaining territories—the majority—fall within a similarly disparate range, from 16% in Castile-La Mancha to 43% in Murcia, as there is no region where prices have decreased during the analyzed period.
This is how housing prices rose from 2020 to 2025
Average price as of December (90m2 property)
Looking more closely at the provincial level, one province stands out even more than the Balearic Islands: in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, prices have risen by 62.88% over the past five years, just ahead of the Balearic Islands themselves (+62.52%). Not far behind is Málaga, another epicenter of the real estate boom, with a 62.02% increase. Madrid and Valencia, with price increases of 53.45% and 50.16% respectively, round out the list of provinces that have seen apartment prices soar by more than 50%. In this case, there have been price drops over the past five years, most notably in Palencia (-7.10%), Zamora (-6.80%), León (-4.76%), Ourense (-2.99%), and Huesca (-2.85%).
Breaking down the analysis to the level of provincial capitals reveals a third dimension to the same issue. According to the report, Palma de Mallorca leads the price increases with a 70.27% jump, confirming the well-known price pressures in the Balearic city, where an apartment that cost €280,586 in 2020 required €477,754 by the end of 2025. It is followed by Málaga (+67.44%), Alicante (+64.18%), Valencia (+64.07%), Madrid (+62.69%), Santa Cruz de Tenerife (+46.81%), Soria (+42.92%), Ávila (+39.83%), Huelva (+39.78%), and Murcia (+39.47%). In this case, price decreases were only recorded in Huesca (-5.13%) and Palencia (-0.82%).
The analysis highlights the profound territorial differences between tourist areas and large cities and inland Spain, where price movements are more moderate. In this regard, Ferran Font, spokesperson and director of Studies at pisos.com, emphasizes a «very marked territorial gap in the evolution of housing prices,» especially in coastal provinces and major cities, «due to very strong demand, both residential and investment, compared to a clearly insufficient supply.» According to the expert, this uneven behavior confirms that the real estate market can no longer be analyzed from a national perspective, but rather a provincial one, «since while some areas face serious accessibility problems due to the sharp price increases, others continue to struggle to maintain their residential appeal and curb depopulation.»
According to Font, «the Spanish real estate market is going through an unprecedented affordability crisis, with increases that more than double the accumulated inflation during the period,» which is around 22%.