Where do the Costa del Sol market numbers on this site come from?
In 30 seconds
The statistics pages are computed from our own catalogue, frozen in a dated quarterly snapshot (currently 2026-08-12, 9.166 listings), use medians gated by a minimum sample of 10, and publish asking prices only, labelled as such. What we cannot source, we do not print.
What data source sits behind the Costa del Sol statistics?
The base is our own sales catalogue for the Costa del Sol: 8.880 resale homes and 286 new-build projects at the current measurement, drawn from the shared listing networks the coast's agencies work on plus developer feeds. It is one of the larger stocks visible in one place, and it is still one catalogue: private sales and stock exclusive to other networks are outside it, so our figures describe this catalogue, clearly dated, not a census of the coast.On the first working days of each quarter we freeze the catalogue's statistics into a dated snapshot file: every count, median, price band, type bucket and completion year, per town and per cut. The statistics pages in this section are built from that snapshot, which is why every figure on them can name its measurement date. The current snapshot is 2026-Q3, taken 12 August 2026.
How are the medians computed, and when do we refuse to show one?
Headline figures are medians, not averages. This coast's stock runs from 100.000 € to 35,000,000 €, and on a distribution with that tail an average answers "how expensive are the expensive ones" more than "what does a typical home ask". Averages appear only where explicitly labelled.Every median is gated by a minimum sample: below 10 listings, no median is published, full stop. A median over seven homes is an anecdote wearing a number's clothes. Where a table shows a sample between 10 and about 100, we say in the table note that the figure is a level, not a precise point, because thin samples move between quarters without the place changing.
- Median over averageHalf ask less, half ask more. Robust against the luxury tail that makes coastal averages meaningless.
- Minimum sample of 10Below 10 listings a median is suppressed entirely rather than published with a warning.
- Sample size printedTown tables carry the listing count next to the median, so you can weigh the number yourself.
- One basis per tableEvery comparison table is computed from one source on one date. We never mix a live number into a snapshot table.
Why can two pages show different counts for the same town?
Because "how many listings does this town have" genuinely has more than one answer, and we would rather explain that than hide it. A town's catalogue page counts live filtered results, including or excluding sub-areas depending on how you search. The statistics roll-up assigns each listing to one town once, on the snapshot date. The two rules serve different jobs: the catalogue count must match the grid of homes in front of you; the statistics count must make towns comparable with each other.Two more counting rules are worth knowing. New-build projects count as one each, however many units they contain, and their prices are per-project "from" floors; the supply and completions pages restate this wherever it matters. And a listing's presence says nothing about its realism: an overpriced home that never sells counts exactly like one that sells next week.
Are these real prices, and where do sold prices come from?
Everything computed from the catalogue is an asking price. Spain does not publish per-listing sold prices, so nobody can honestly show achieved prices per home; what exists is official aggregate data, at province level, with a delay. We treat the two layers strictly separately: catalogue statistics are labelled asking prices, and sold-price or transaction figures appear only quoted from the named official releases in our quarterly market reports.
| Layer | What it measures | Where it appears |
|---|---|---|
| Our catalogue snapshots | Asking prices, supply composition and the new-build pipeline, per town and per cut, quarterly. | These statistics pages, each figure dated. |
| Colegio de Registradores | Completed transactions and buyer nationality, Málaga province, quarterly. | Quarterly market reports, with release named. |
| Ministerio de Vivienda / INE | Appraised and sold-value series, mortgages, permits, province level. | Quarterly market reports, with release named. |
Which numbers do we refuse to publish, and why?
A statistics section earns trust by what it declines to print. Four refusals are policy here, not gaps we are embarrassed about.
- No demand index from our web trafficSite analytics measure our marketing, not the market. Demand figures come from official transaction and mortgage series or not at all.
- No invented historyOur measured series starts 2026-Q3. Earlier movements are quoted only from official series, never reconstructed from portal charts.
- No unsourced nationality sharesBuyer-mix figures appear only from the registrars' releases, dated. Our own client mix, when published, is labelled as ours.
- No achieved-price claimsWe never present an asking median as what buyers pay, and no page here implies a typical discount, because we cannot measure one.
The same policy in one sentence: every number on these pages carries its source and date, and a number that cannot carry both stays unpublished.
Known weaknesses of this methodology
One catalogue is not the market. Ours is large and shared-network based, but a listing universe always shapes its statistics; another large catalogue would show slightly different medians.Quarterly is slow for supply and fine for prices. Counts move daily and our published counts are up to three months old by design; the trade is traceability, and the live catalogue is one click away for anyone who needs today's number.New-build statistics describe projects, not units, and entry prices, not typical prices. Per-unit new-build statistics would be better and the data does not carry them yet.The series is young. The methodology is built for comparability over years, but as of today it has one measurement, and this page will not pretend otherwise.
Frequently asked questions
- Can I trust an agency's own market statistics?
- Only as far as they are checkable, which is exactly what this page is for: dated snapshots, stated rules, sample sizes printed, sources named, and the refusals listed. Judge us on whether a figure here ever appears without its date and basis.
- Why do your numbers differ from the big portals' reports?
- Different stock, different rules: every portal computes over its own listings, and methods differ in counting, medians and cut-offs. Rankings and directions usually agree; exact levels rarely do. That is normal, and it is why our figures always name their basis.
- When are these statistics updated?
- Quarterly, from a snapshot taken in the first days of each quarter. The current figures are from 12 August 2026 (the 2026-Q3 measurement). Official figures in the market reports follow their publishers' calendars, roughly one to two months behind each quarter.
- What is a median and why do you insist on it?
- The middle value: half of the listings ask less, half ask more. On a market whose top end reaches 35 million euros, an average would be dragged far above what a typical buyer meets, so medians carry every headline here.