In 2020, the year of the pandemic and two devastating earthquakes, almost 32,000 properties were sold in Croatia, only 3,000 less than in 2019, and the fall mainly occurred along the coast, while almost one in two properties in Istria was bought by foreigners, Vecernji List daily said on Saturday.

The largest number of flats, about 12,000, was sold in the City of Zagreb and Zagreb County, followed by a little over 10,000 properties sold in the coastal counties and a little over 9,000 in the rest of the country.

The rest of the country recorded the smallest drop in sales, about 2%, while the drop along the Adriatic was almost by one-fifth due to fewer foreign buyers. The drop in Zagreb and its environs was 4.5%.

In terms of the coast, last year foreigners bought four in ten properties sold in Istria County, three in ten in Primorje-Gorski Kotar County, one in four in Zadar County, one in five in the Dubrovnik and Sibenik areas, and 16% in Split-Dalmatia County.

As for continental Croatia, foreigners bought 2% of the properties sold in Međimurje and Varazdin counties.

Most of the foreign buyers were from Germany, Austria and Slovenia.

In 2020, the housing market showed resilience to the current crisis, so stronger risks to financial stability linked to that market could occur in the period ahead, according to the central bank.