For those who are not familiar with Virtuoso, it is nothing more nothing less than a huge network of the best luxury travel agencies, with more than 17,500 advisors worldwide.

Virtuoso releases a luxury european tour report every year, in which displays what the travelers seek when looking for a perfect holiday destination. The report for this year, revealed that people are looking for pristine, unique and less-known destinations to visit.

European Tour

In 2018, Croatia featured on the second place on list of top emerging destination, amongst Japan, Portugal, Cuba and Iceland.

If you think of Croatia, you instantly might think of the popular spots such as Dubrovnik, Hvar, Split and Rovinj. Although those regions are espectacular and have plenty to offer, the uniqueness and authenticity of destinations that are still not very explored and overcrowded are attracting the attention of tourists.

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A huge loan designated to real estate Croatia is ahead, and coming from The World Bank Group. For the ones who don’t know The World Bank Group, it is nothing more nothing less than the world’s largest sources of funding and knowledge for developing countries. Their intention and commitment is to reduce poverty, increase shared prosperity, and promote sustainable development. And the Country now on their table is Croatia.

19.7 million euros on its way to Croatia

An incredible amount of 19.7 million euros to develop, ease and improve the Administration System Project. The advance is clearly on the days of waiting at  Land Registry Offices that decreased by 75% from 46 to 12 days, for mortgages and property transactions, and also on the Cadasters Offices, decreasing by around 33% from 30 to only 8 days.

But it has been coming this way since 2016

Long ago in November 2016, a system called Joint Information System was implemented, it is easy, completely accesible and modern, so people can register online with their personal details, instead of the going through the painful experience of having to go to a public office. 

You will find that plenty of the real estate Croatia opportunities are located in the overcrowded cities. And, if you have done some initial research on real estate investment opportunities, you will most definitely have heard of Njuškalo, the main and most known portal in Croatia.

This month, Njuškalo held a conference in Zagreb which the subjects approached were tourism, being the main industry in the country, combined with real estate investing. Together they have created a market with huge potential and definitely worthy of investing in.

During the conference, Robert Pakrovac, from Estre, one of the top banks in Croatia, said “ We’re an open book on which other sectors such as tourism, and ultimately the retirement of people in Croatia, lean on”

It is common to find real estate prices in overcrowded areas higher than in other locations. Due to the simple fact that there is more demand for these real estates. This is because many of these areas are popular destinations for both tourists and first time buyers who are less knowledgeable on Croatia and the real estate market.

However, recently more and more tourist and first time buyers are looking away from these popular areas and are in search for authenticity, privacy and unique experiences. These can be found in the lesser known regions of Croatia.

One of the best investments one could do is property investing, but it can also be very difficult decision requiring research on the area the property is located and on the property itself, apart from a lot of budgeting or financing for most people. For that reason, It can be really a decision for life if that is the case as if you decide to finance you will have a couple of year of mortgage awaiting for you.

How then to make the most of your money and depending on the area even an income?

To make an income it is important to decide on a property that is located in a very attractive area or country. This way you guarantee there will be away interest from tourists to stay in your house if you decide to rent it. That is the core of buying an investment property as well as in an area. Buying an investment property has to both ways, for the investor and for the guests.

To make this comparison simpler we selected a few countries and the prices for a house in comparison to Croatia. So, here is a brief list of properties in Europe. There are requirements you can stick to when looking for an investment property abroad, on the list below the requirements were either price or number of rooms.

A mediterranean lifestyle is what most people should aim for. But why is that? The Mediterranean diet and active life is a healthy and pleasant way of living.

The proof that mediterranean lifestyle and diet is so healthy, is in the fact that mediterranean countries have amongst the highest life expectancies in the world.

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If you plan to buy a property for sale in Croatia, you might be wondering about the numbers, how much capital you have to invest, what are going to be the costs and the maintenance and finally, your return of investment.

Surely those numbers are really important, but you should also consider a property for sale in Croatia as a home you could live in. During the building stage of your home, you look for high quality materials, best performance and the effect they will have on your pocket.

Home abroad

Croatia is know as a sunny and warm country, but what many people don’t know is that, during the winter the temperatures can go as low as -5 degrees on January, and as high as 38 degrees on the peak of summer in July.

The temperature variation is a very important factor that you have to consider when buying a property for sale in Croatia.

That is why it is fundamental to check if the property has good appliances but mostly importantly, good thermal insulation that is be able to maintain the heat and the cooling in the house. Like this, you will have to turn those appliances on less often, reducing the bills and increasing the life expectancy of those equipments.

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With a very extended coast comes a large amount of Croatian islands. 1,800 kilometres of coastline in the entire country and nearly a third of this coast, including islands and islets, is Istrian!

The location of your villa in Marčana is central, giving you a favourable position you to explore the surrounding paradises.

Let’s start near

The closest island and National Park to your luscious investment property is called Brijuni and it is formed by 14 islands and islets.

According to the Istrian legend, God created Istria as an extension of Heaven. The devil then, out of jealousy, scattered stones around the peninsula. Angels then gathered the pieces of Heaven remaining among the scattered rocks and protected them by the sea waves. And created Brijuni.

The island was owned by an Austrian who had the intention of turning it into a resort. The eccentric taste, brought some exotic fauna and flora to Croatia.

In the early 80’s the Island was considered a National Park. Nowadays, everyone can easily reach this piece of heaven by ferry. To get from your villa to this beauty, you can drive towards to Fažana port, only 25 minutes away, and catch a ferry from the port to the island. After that, all you need to do is enjoy your day!

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If you are looking for a gluten-free diet while in Istria, you are in for a treat. Croatian food is traditionally is based naturally in gluten-free ingredients, while celiac-friendly pizzas will make your Croatian food experience complete.

Croatian food and Istrian cuisine is celiac-friendly

Traditional Istrian cuisine is a Mediterranean one, with a dose of continental influence. Locals rely on fish, olive oil, fresh fruit and vegetables, and throw in a piece of pork or ox meat for good measure. 

For those looking for a healthy, gluten-free diet, it means their options are readily available in farmers’ markets, restaurants and shops. A bit of planning in advance will make sure they taste all the flavors of Istria.  

Over 1 million tourists arrived in Istria in August 2018, generating 8.5 million overnight stays all over the peninsula

The region of Marčana in Istria, where Candy Brick villas are located, had an increase of 9% arrivals in comparison to August 2017. This generated an impressive 5,000 more overnight stays. These numbers keep increasing over the years.

The good news about these numbers are that they show the region of Istria is attracting an incredibly large amount of tourists. This is impressive considering that there are only 208 thousand inhabitants in an area of just 2,813 km².

Istria is divided into 10 officially designated cities and 31 rural municipalities. During the summer peaks, it can get overcrowded and lack of options for accommodation creating more opportunity for rentals.

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Imagine you invest and become an owner of a luxury villa holidays in Croatia, which doesn’t have the Candy Brick Full Management Guarantee.

The villa is in an attractive location in the south of Istria. In fact, the region is attracting many tourists every year and offers plenty of reasons for people to come over and visit, such as short distance from Pula and Rovinj, the sea, astonishing nature, healthy outdoor lifestyle and active lifestyle and last but definitely not least, the gastronomy.

But between so many accommodation options, how do you make your villa attractive for tourists and make them chose your villa amongst the others?

The answer to this question is not only having high-quality holiday villa, but also providing excellent and efficient service for the guests and no stress for the owner of this property.

So, what options are left when it comes to managing your holiday home?

1.) Option 1: do-it-yourself: 

Advertising your house online, this step can be simple, with research on where to advertise the property it is possible to know how and where to place your advertisement.

However, making the villa available online is a whole different step. It means you would have to organise and manage the booking requests, making sure there is no double booking or overlapping days and as a busy person, you would want to avoid that.

Nowadays people, in general, are extremely busy, the last thing anyone needs is one more chore to fit in their schedule, especially if this task is another full-time job.

The goal of a smart investor is to automatise the profit, keeping his time to do what is a priority and make the capital work for itself.

2.) Option II: giving this responsibility to an agency 

This solution sounds great at first, but considering it more carefully, tourist agencies may not be able to represent and show the assets of your holiday villa in the correct way. Because of their extended list of properties to manage, they might not give your property the attention it requires and deserves.

For example, if your property is worth 1.5 mln euros, it is very likely it has plenty of refined rooms, a beautiful garden, a gym, a lot of gadgets, infinity pool and to top it up, a really polished design that tourists would be willing to pay more for.

Those are the selling points to rent your property out. But unfortunately, if the agency is managing hundreds of other properties, they might not be aware of and take all the features mentioned above for granted.

As a result, they can end up following the standard procedure of taking a couple of photographs of the most common rooms. Misrepresentation can lead to a shortage of bookings, as the villa won’t be appealing for the tourists amongst the other rental properties and the rental income can decrease if the features are not displayed and justified on the rental price.

The commission

Commissions can be quite high in those agencies, amounts around 30%-40% of your income for the service. This service usually does not include cleaning, welcoming guests, an available hotline for unexpected issues, gardening and etc. You would more than likely have to pay another company to look after those tasks.

The options above are not ideal for a busy investor that wishes to maximise their financial return and doesn’t have time to dedicate on property management, it also might be the case it is not in their interest to dedicate time for this task anyway

Candy Brick Full Management Service

The Candy Brick Full Management Guarantee is amongst the other guarantees offered to investors, protecting their interest and maximising their financial return.

With the Candy Brick, Full Management Guarantee you have trusted and professional staff taking care of your holiday villa and of your guests. The services the Full Management Guarantee includes are:

• Marketing your villa holidays
• Managing bookings
• Welcoming the guests
• Cleaning the villa and doing the laundry
• Gardening and pool cleaning
• Hosting the guests
• Also, a hotline always available for the guests to call any time to solve any problem

And what is even better is that the charge is only 20% of your income, which is much less compared to other agencies, and all the services in relation to rental management are included in the price.

As a result of this service, you get the best return on your investment without the need to worry about anything or having to deal with different companies.

A professional and reliable management service is key for your investment, so the staff maintaining the villa is local and well qualified. With this guarantee, all you have to do is sit back and enjoy your €30,000 rental income every year.

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