House prices down 34.14% y-o-y in Q1 2020

Egypt’s housing market continues to struggle, with the nationwide real estate index falling by a whopping 34.14% during the year to Q1 2020, worse than the previous year’s 22.61% y-o-y decline. Real house prices fell sharply by 29.67% q-o-q during the latest quarter.

Property restrictions lifted, but oversupply pulling house prices 

President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi recently removed the last restrictions on foreign ownership of land and property in Egypt, in an effort to buoy the housing market. He also allowed the government, the biggest landowner in Egypt, to use its land for public-private partnership schemes. However house prices are being undermined by the vast amount of new construction, for instance in the new capital.

Rents, rental yields: excellent yields in Cairo at 9.40% 

Cairo apartments are inexpensive at around $831 per sq. m. 

Egypt: typical city centre apartment buying price, monthly rent (120 sq. m)
  Buying price Rate per month Yield
Cairo   $124,650    $977 9.04%

Recent news. After expanding by an average of 4.6% annually in the past four years, Egypt’s economy grew by 5.6% in 2019, as various economic reforms are now starting to boost business investment and private consumption. The government’s IMF-spurred policy reforms have contributed to an upgrade of its sovereign credit rating by Fitch Ratings in March 2019 and followed by Moody’s in April 2019. 

In April 2020, both S&P and Moody’s affirmed Egypt’s sovereign credit rating with stable outlook, reflecting their confidence in the country’s ability to positively deal with the coronavirus outbreak.

Egypt is one of the only two countries in the MENA region whose economy the IMF expects to grow in 2020, at a rate of 2%.