American Buyers Set Their Sights on Europe

Kathryn Gamble, a Chicago veterinarian, and her husband, Texas orchestra conductor Robert Carter Austin, have been frequent visitors to Venice for more than two decades, staying in hotels or short-term rentals. They were ready to buy a home there in 2020, but Covid-19 intervened.

Now, as trans-Atlantic travel for Americans tentatively resumes, they are restarting their search.

During the couple’s most recent Venetian sojourn in 2018, they rented a palazzo on the Grand Canal, recalls Dr. Gamble. They hosted friends and family, and flew a Texas flag from the balcony. Looking ahead to ownership, they hope to recapture some of that atmosphere.

“We need to be on the water,” says the 54-year-old. “And we need to have three or four bedrooms. It’s Venice, and people will come to visit.”

Dr. Gamble and her husband, 75, recently made inquiries about a nine-bedroom, 17th-century Grand Canal palazzo listed for $11.2 million, according to Knight Frank, which is handling the sale. On the other side of the canal, a six-bedroom, 3,800-square-foot apartment in an early-20th-century building is listed for $2.7 million.

From Lisbon to the Greek islands, the Americans are back, ready to take advantage of the buyer’s market in many of Europe’s leading resort areas. There are bargains to be had at the entry and mid-levels, with prices buoyant at the top end.

In mid-June, the European Union reopened nonessential travel from the U.S., prompting a jump in property inquires, says Mark Knight, a London-based partner and head of international residential sales at the U.K.’s Knight Frank. He says the latest wave of house-hunters are especially interested in vacation homes in Italy and France, and he also has seen more calls about Lisbon. At Savills, another U.K. real-estate company, inquiries from Americans have doubled compared with this time last year, says Hugo Thistlethwayte, head of global residential operations.

Knight Frank last week released its Global Residential Cities Index for the first quarter of 2021, giving a view of price changes from the year-earlier period, when lockdowns began to take hold worldwide. It shows double-digit increases clustered in the Nordic countries and Eastern Europe, while prime European second-home destinations that had been inching toward the top in previous years—including Lisbon and Malaga on Spain’s Costa del Sol—are seeing declines.

In Venice, real-estate prices are down by 4.3% over the past year, Knight Frank shows. “It’s not like it was before,” says Giovanni Rubin de Cervin Albrizzi, a local architect. “But recently, there have been lots of French and Germans, and the Americans are starting to come just now.”

Mr. Rubin, who specializes in renovations of historic properties, says the pandemic changed his business. Instead of full-scale renovations of second homes, he is doing more partial projects on long-term rentals, where such work is done by renters in exchange for discounts.

Jeffrey Alexopulos, another Texan, is looking in Marbella. Overall prices in the Spanish coastal resort fell 10.3% from spring 2020 to 2021, says Andrea de la Hoz, senior analyst at Tinsa, a Spanish real-estate consultancy. Mr. Alexopulos says his interest was piqued by a three-bedroom Marbella apartment listed at $515,000, down from the $770,000 the owner had paid a few years ago. He attributes the fall to the drop in vacation rentals.

At the luxury end, however, purchases have surged to a level not seen before, says Christopher Clover of Panorama Properties.

He currently is selling a five bedroom, 13,364-square-foot villa in La Zagaleta, a gated Marbella-area mountain development, for $19.9 million. Earlier, a 33,500-square-foot villa on 3.4 acres in the same development, listed for $37.9 million, sold after two years on the market.

Americans, known for favoring traditional properties, are now are in line in Marbella with international preferences toward new construction, says Mr. Clover.

Mr. Alexopulos, 68, and his wife, Janet Ferrari, 55, who co-own backyard-game manufacturer Free Donkey Sports, say they see Europe as offering a better return on a second home for themselves and their London-based son. “The prices in the U.S. are crazy right now,” says Mr. Alexopulos. They recently sold an Orlando, Fla., property they owned.

Americans typically play a niche role in Southern Europe’s luxury second-home markets, which tend to be dominated by sun-hungry Northern Europeans. But they have traditionally made themselves more conspicuous at the very top of those markets.

A Knight Frank study on French markets shows Riviera prices are static at 1% increase during 2020, but they still are the country’s highest. Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat, a tiny peninsula near Nice, has the country’s most expensive real estate at $3,855 a square foot.

In search of quieter or more authentic options, American looking in the area seem most interested in the so-called backcountry listings, such as a six-bedroom stone farmhouse, dating to the 18th century, a 40-minute drive from Antibes. The 2.2-acre property has an asking price of $7.4 million.

Americans should expect evolving rules for travel and viewings across Europe. Mr. Alexopulos says he and his wife—both fully vaccinated—are preparing for their trip by monitoring U.S. State Department information on Spain, as well as the Spanish health website. They also stay in touch with their airline.

In Lisbon, now a major tourist destination and second-home market, prices fell 3.8% from the first quarter of 2020 to the 2021 period, according to Knight Frank.

Newer arrivals include those in Lisbon’s growing high-tech scene, says Lindsey Elkin, co-founder of Yayem, a members club and digital platform based in greater Lisbon. Ms. Elkin, 31, a Philadelphia native, says American tech-industry expats are looking for homes in Lapa and Santos, historic districts with river views.

Vitor Almeida, a Portuguese architect with a high-end residential practice that caters to expatriates, says the pandemic brought delays to renovations but no added expenses. Last year, he completed a $1.1 million renovation of a 3,500-square-foot unit in Lisbon for Cinara Ruiz, a Brazilian entrepreneur who divides her time between Portugal and Brazil. Work included restoring the apartment’s original frescoes and adding two full baths and three half-baths to what had once been a one-bathroom home for a single family. Mrs. Ruiz, 53, bought the property for $3 million in 2019.

Americans also are showing renewed interest in Greece, one of the first European countries to welcome them back this year. According to Greece Sotheby’s International Realty, U.S. inquiries were up by 60% this spring, compared with spring 2020. Francis Michael Prantounas, sales director of Engel & Völkers Greece, says luxury prices are strong on the islands of Santorini and Mykonos, and bargains are found on Paros, an island south of Mykonos.

Prices in Mykonos—which has gone from a hippie redoubt to a gay mecca to an exclusive vacation enclave—have jumped nearly 5% over last year, says an analysis from Engel & Völkers.

Vana Verouti, a 70-year-old Greek singer and interior designer, bought an empty lot on the island’s southeast tip in 1995 and built a 3,800-square-foot villa with her now-deceased husband. Ms. Verouti—who divides her time between Athens, Mykonos and a home in Switzerland—has put her 1.7-acre property on the market for $3.1 million.

Mykonos competes with the island of Corfu for Greece’s most expensive vacation homes, says Savvas Savvaidis, of Greece Sotheby’s International Realty. He says Americans make up about 10% of Greece’s luxury market. Mykonos’s most expensive properties, he adds, tend to be on the west side, to take advantage of dramatic sunsets and easy access to Mykonos Town, as the island’s largest settlement is known.

PARIS —Paris has long been a byword for luxurious living. The traditional components of the upscale home, from parquet floors to elaborate moldings, have their origins here. Yet settling down in just the right address in this low-rise, high-density city may be the greatest luxury of all.

Tradition reigns supreme in Paris real estate, where certain conditions seem set in stone—the western half of the city, on either side of the Seine, has long been more expensive than the east. But in the fashion world’s capital, parts of the housing market are also subject to shifting fads. In the trendy, hilly northeast, a roving cool factor can send prices in this year’s hip neighborhood rising, while last year’s might seem like a sudden bargain.

This week, with the opening of the Olympic Games and the eyes of the world turned toward Paris, The Wall Street Journal looks at the most expensive and desirable areas in the City of Light.

The Most Expensive Arrondissement: the 6th

Known for historic architecture, elegant apartment houses and bohemian street cred, the 6th Arrondissement is Paris’s answer to Manhattan’s West Village. Like its New York counterpart, the 6th’s starving-artist days are long behind it. But the charm that first wooed notable residents like Gertrude Stein and Jean-Paul Sartre is still largely intact, attracting high-minded tourists and deep-pocketed homeowners who can afford its once-edgy, now serene atmosphere.

Le Breton George V Notaires, a Paris notary with an international clientele, says the 6th consistently holds the title of most expensive arrondissement among Paris’s 20 administrative districts, and 2023 was no exception. Last year, average home prices reached $1,428 a square foot—almost 30% higher than the Paris average of $1,100 a square foot.

According to Meilleurs Agents, the Paris real estate appraisal company, the 6th is also home to three of the city’s five most expensive streets. Rue de Furstemberg, a secluded loop between Boulevard Saint-Germain and the Seine, comes in on top, with average prices of $2,454 a square foot as of March 2024.

For more than two decades, Kyle Branum, a 51-year-old attorney, and Kimberly Branum, a 60-year-old retired CEO, have been regular visitors to Paris, opting for apartment rentals and ultimately an ownership interest in an apartment in the city’s 7th Arrondissement, a sedate Left Bank district known for its discreet atmosphere and plutocratic residents.

“The 7th was the only place we stayed,” says Kimberly, “but we spent most of our time in the 6th.”

In 2022, inspired by the strength of the dollar, the Branums decided to fulfil a longstanding dream of buying in Paris. Working with Paris Property Group, they opted for a 1,465-square-foot, three-bedroom in a building dating to the 17th century on a side street in the 6th Arrondissement. They paid $2.7 million for the unit and then spent just over $1 million on the renovation, working with Franco-American visual artist Monte Laster, who also does interiors.

The couple, who live in Santa Barbara, Calif., plan to spend about three months a year in Paris, hosting children and grandchildren, and cooking after forays to local food markets. Their new kitchen, which includes a French stove from luxury appliance brand Lacanche, is Kimberly’s favourite room, she says.

Another American, investor Ashley Maddox, 49, is also considering relocating.

In 2012, the longtime Paris resident bought a dingy, overstuffed 1,765-square-foot apartment in the 6th and started from scratch. She paid $2.5 million and undertook a gut renovation and building improvements for about $800,000. A centrepiece of the home now is the one-time salon, which was turned into an open-plan kitchen and dining area where Maddox and her three children tend to hang out, American-style. Just outside her door are some of the city’s best-known bakeries and cheesemongers, and she is a short walk from the Jardin du Luxembourg, the Left Bank’s premier green space.

“A lot of the majesty of the city is accessible from here,” she says. “It’s so central, it’s bananas.” Now that two of her children are going away to school, she has listed the four-bedroom apartment with Varenne for $5 million.

The Most Expensive Neighbourhoods: Notre-Dame and Invalides

Garrow Kedigian is moving up in the world of Parisian real estate by heading south of the Seine.

During the pandemic, the Canada-born, New York-based interior designer reassessed his life, he says, and decided “I’m not going to wait any longer to have a pied-à-terre in Paris.”

He originally selected a 1,130-square-foot one-bedroom in the trendy 9th Arrondissement, an up-and-coming Right Bank district just below Montmartre. But he soon realised it was too small for his extended stays, not to mention hosting guests from out of town.

After paying about $1.6 million in 2022 and then investing about $55,000 in new decor, he put the unit up for sale in early 2024 and went house-shopping a second time. He ended up in the Invalides quarter of the 7th Arrondissement in the shadow of one Paris’s signature monuments, the golden-domed Hôtel des Invalides, which dates to the 17th century and is fronted by a grand esplanade.

His new neighbourhood vies for Paris’s most expensive with the Notre-Dame quarter in the 4th Arrondissement, centred on a few islands in the Seine behind its namesake cathedral. According to Le Breton, home prices in the Notre-Dame neighbourhood were $1,818 a square foot in 2023, followed by $1,568 a square foot in Invalides.

After breaking even on his Right Bank one-bedroom, Kedigian paid $2.4 million for his new 1,450-square-foot two-bedroom in a late 19th-century building. It has southern exposures, rounded living-room windows and “gorgeous floors,” he says. Kedigian, who bought the new flat through Junot Fine Properties/Knight Frank, plans to spend up to $435,000 on a renovation that will involve restoring the original 12-foot ceiling height in many of the rooms, as well as rescuing the ceilings’ elaborate stucco detailing. He expects to finish in 2025.

Over in the Notre-Dame neighbourhood, Belles demeures de France/Christie’s recently sold a 2,370-square-foot, four-bedroom home for close to the asking price of about $8.6 million, or about $3,630 a square foot. Listing agent Marie-Hélène Lundgreen says this places the unit near the very top of Paris luxury real estate, where prime homes typically sell between $2,530 and $4,040 a square foot.

The Most Expensive Suburb: Neuilly-sur-Seine

The Boulevard Périphérique, the 22-mile ring road that surrounds Paris and its 20 arrondissements, was once a line in the sand for Parisians, who regarded the French capital’s numerous suburbs as something to drive through on their way to and from vacation. The past few decades have seen waves of gentrification beyond the city’s borders, upgrading humble or industrial districts to the north and east into prime residential areas. And it has turned Neuilly-sur-Seine, just northwest of the city, into a luxury compound of first resort.

In 2023, Neuilly’s average home price of $1,092 a square foot made the leafy, stately community Paris’s most expensive suburb.

Longtime residents, Alain and Michèle Bigio, decided this year is the right time to list their 7,730-square-foot, four-bedroom townhouse on a gated Neuilly street.

The couple, now in their mid 70s, completed the home in 1990, two years after they purchased a small parcel of garden from the owners next door for an undisclosed amount. Having relocated from a white-marble château outside Paris, the couple echoed their previous home by using white- and cream-coloured stone in the new four-story build. The Bigios, who will relocate just back over the border in the 16th Arrondissement, have listed the property with Emile Garcin Propriétés for $14.7 million.

The couple raised two adult children here and undertook upgrades in their empty-nester years—most recently, an indoor pool in the basement and a new elevator.

The cool, pale interiors give way to dark and sardonic images in the former staff’s quarters in the basement where Alain works on his hobby—surreal and satirical paintings, whose risqué content means that his wife prefers they stay downstairs. “I’m not a painter,” he says. “But I paint.”

The Trendiest Arrondissement: the 9th

French interior designer Julie Hamon is theatre royalty. Her grandfather was playwright Jean Anouilh, a giant of 20th-century French literature, and her sister is actress Gwendoline Hamon. The 52-year-old, who divides her time between Paris and the U.K., still remembers when the city’s 9th Arrondissement, where she and her husband bought their 1,885-square-foot duplex in 2017, was a place to have fun rather than put down roots. Now, the 9th is the place to do both.

The 9th, a largely 19th-century district, is Paris at its most urban. But what it lacks in parks and other green spaces, it makes up with nightlife and a bustling street life. Among Paris’s gentrifying districts, which have been transformed since 2000 from near-slums to the brink of luxury, the 9th has emerged as the clear winner. According to Le Breton, average 2023 home prices here were $1,062 a square foot, while its nearest competitors for the cool crown, the 10th and the 11th, have yet to break $1,011 a square foot.

A co-principal in the Bobo Design Studio, Hamon—whose gut renovation includes a dramatic skylight, a home cinema and air conditioning—still seems surprised at how far her arrondissement has come. “The 9th used to be well known for all the theatres, nightclubs and strip clubs,” she says. “But it was never a place where you wanted to live—now it’s the place to be.”

With their youngest child about to go to college, she and her husband, 52-year-old entrepreneur Guillaume Clignet, decided to list their Paris home for $3.45 million and live in London full-time. Propriétés Parisiennes/Sotheby’s is handling the listing, which has just gone into contract after about six months on the market.

The 9th’s music venues were a draw for 44-year-old American musician and piano dealer, Ronen Segev, who divides his time between Miami and a 1,725-square-foot, two-bedroom in the lower reaches of the arrondissement. Aided by Paris Property Group, Segev purchased the apartment at auction during the pandemic, sight unseen, for $1.69 million. He spent $270,000 on a renovation, knocking down a wall to make a larger salon suitable for home concerts.

During the Olympics, Segev is renting out the space for about $22,850 a week to attendees of the Games. Otherwise, he prefers longer-term sublets to visiting musicians for $32,700 a month.

Most Exclusive Address: Avenue Junot

Hidden in the hilly expanses of the 18th Arrondissement lies a legendary street that, for those in the know, is the city’s most exclusive address. Avenue Junot, a bucolic tree-lined lane, is a fairy-tale version of the city, separate from the gritty bustle that surrounds it.

Homes here rarely come up for sale, and, when they do, they tend to be off-market, or sold before they can be listed. Martine Kuperfis—whose Paris-based Junot Group real-estate company is named for the street—says the most expensive units here are penthouses with views over the whole of the city.

In 2021, her agency sold a 3,230-square-foot triplex apartment, with a 1,400-square-foot terrace, for $8.5 million. At about $2,630 a square foot, that is three times the current average price in the whole of the 18th.

Among its current Junot listings is a 1930s 1,220-square-foot townhouse on the avenue’s cobblestone extension, with an asking price of $2.8 million.