As the largest brokerage firm dedicated solely to real estate transactions, built on a business created nearly 50 years ago, the team of Sibarth Real Estate has an unmatched expertise of the market. This depth of experience and knowledge is essential for maintaining a keen understanding of real estate market trends, which in turn enables us to provide insightful advice and guidance to our clients, whether buying or selling properties. This expertise is particularly vital in markets like St Barth, where official data is scarce and difficult to obtain, even today.
Over the years, our team has built up economic intelligence by gathering all available data from multiple sources. This allows us to offer here as example a numeric analysis of the real estate landscape between 2017 and 2021.
By doing so, we can provide a precise understanding of how the market evolved over five years marked by both a devastating hurricane, a relatively local factor, and the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic. This data underlines our knowledge of the market and allows to quantify these observations with numerical evidence.
2017 & 2018 HURRICANE IRMA IMPACT
In September 2017, St Barth wash it by one of the most powerful hurricanes ever documented causing significant damages on most of the homes and island infrastructure.
An analysis of the data reveals that between 2017 and 2018, the number of home sales plummeted by 55%.Additionally, the total number of property transactions fell by 26%, and the average sale price decreased by roughly 22%. Importantly, this decline in both transaction volume and average sale price does not reflect a depreciation in property values.
Rather, it indicates that most homeowners were fully insured and opted to focus on the repair, if not the improvement, of their homes. In the rare cases of sales «as is» of damaged homes, the price was generally adjusted to only account for the cost of repair, with the buyer usually receiving compensation equal to the insurance settlement. Between 2017 and 2018, Sibarth Real Estate brokered 100% of transactions of villas on the island exceeding 10M €. This included a record sale at the end of 2017, after IRMA hit the island, the Girasol Estate which sold for over 60M USD.
2019 RECOVERY AND RESURGENCE
The island’s recovery and themarket’s resurgence began in 2019. The number of transactions increased by 13% compared to 2018, but what was even more surprising was that the total euros sales volume exceeded 2017 figures by 10%.
Additionally, the average sale prices for both homes and land surged, with an average sale price that was 30%higher than even in 2017. The infusion of insurance money into the market, coupled with confidence in St Barths’ ability to rebound even after the most severe storms, only highlighted the market’s resilience and desirability.
2020 COVID-19 PANDEMIC
The emergence of COVID-19 in early 2020 introduced a great deal of uncertainty into the market but by the end ofthe year although there was a drop of 13% in the number of transactions, the overall average sale price had increased by 24%, with the total euros sales volume rising by 9% compared to 2019.
This period marked the beginning of what could be termed the «Golden Age of Relocation». The search for large rhouses in safe places became a priority as remote working became the norm. 2020 also saw the sale of the Camp David property on St Jean beach at 70M €. Sibarth Real Estate is proud to have also handled that year over 60% of transactions above 10M €.
2021 RECORD BREAKING YEAR
While the total number of transactions was only about 8% higher compared to 2017, the most significant indicator was that the total euros sales volume basically doubled compared to that same year.
Another noteworthy metric is thatthe number of transactions exceeding 10M € was nearly 3 times higher than in any other year. While the average sale price between 2020 and 2021 increased by around 10%, there were significantly more transactions at higher prices, confirming the trend towards the desire to buy larger properties.
AND AFTER?
Sufficient data is not available yet to fully review 2022, and even less for 2023, but available information suggests that overall activity in 2022 was roughly on par with, or perhaps even slightly higher than, that of 2021 - another exceptional year.
So far, 2023 has remained active ,and the spotlight was once again cast on St Barth with the exceptional sale of the former Rockefeller property in Colombier for 125M €. This sets a new record for both St Barth and the Caribbean. All this data, complemented by exceptional sales, further amplifies the enduring strength and resilience of our market, which consistently exceeds expectations even amidst significant challenges.
Main picture for this article: photo by Hugo Allard
