Alex Trelinski
TORROX is literally Andalucia’s boom town with its population rising over by a third in just eight years.
It numbers 100 different nationalities including British and German expats amongst its 22,345 residents- adding 5,815 newcomers since 2017.
There are no limits to tourist housing but the population increase is being handled in a sustainable way to the benefit of everybody.
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With nine kilometres of coastline within the municipality, its unsurprising that house prices are rising, and there’s more to come with two new urban projects in the pipeline- Calaceite and Puerto Narixa.
Torrox mayor, Oscar Medina, said: “This sustainable development has been important, but we cannot grow at any price and have to analyse multiple factors, including that of tourist housing”.
Jose Antonio Perez, CEO of Real Estate Business School (Rebs) said that the right balance is being achieved.
He stated that for growth to be sustainable, it must be developed together with services, job opportunities and housing.
Perez commented: “Torrox has been growing in seasonal and residential tourism since the 80s, including abandoned mini-farmhouses converted into rural homes and deteriorated village houses rehabilitated by non-residents who use and rent them.
Official figures show Torrox has 1,042 homes registered for tourism- just over 5% of properties.
Perez sees this figure and future rises as not an issue.
“Torrox has balanced the tourist and residential market for decades, along with of village and rural houses,” he commented.
“It has completed the most new homes in the province along with renovated properties attracting residents from Malaga City and neighbouring municipalities, due to housing availability, quality of life and prices”.
He added: “These tourist homes do not harm Torrox at all, since they attract employment, talent, consumption, and taxes provided that infrastructures and services grow and adapt at the same time, which is happening.”
