2 new services to Malta by Ryanair

Ryanair will be operating a new twice weekly service to Edinburgh and Bristol. Flights to Edinburgh will commence as of March 31 while the Bristol service will be launched on July 5.  This is good for those that mat be interested in buying a property in Malta.

The service to Edinburgh will operate on Tuesdays and Saturdays while, flights to Bristol will take place on Wednesday and Sundays.

Speaking at a press conference, Ryanair spokesman Maria Macken stated reminded the public that the airline is offering one million seats on its services to Trapani and Bari for just 1 euro each, starting as of January 19th. Mackenn also called for a reduction of airport fees in Malta, which prove to be four times higher than most European airports.

If you are looking for property, contact a professional real estate agent in Malta to guide you accordingly.

Annual Study Ranks RE/MAX as No. 1 Real Estate Franchise

RE/MAX was named for the 9th time in the past 10 years the number one Global real estate franchise according to the Entrepreneur magazine’s 30th Annual Franchise 500 survey. The closest competitor, Keller Williams, was No. 61, whereas RE/MAX was the first real estate company to be ranked  No. 38.  Many of the known local Maltese competitors did not even figure in the top 200.

The survey appears on the magazine’s Web site and in its January 2009 issue.
Subway came before McDonald’s to capture the top position overall.  RE/MAX ranks No. 10 overall in the Low-Cost Franchises category. It finished No. 1 last year.

RE/MAX has a long, successful history in the survey. It ranked No. 10 overall a year ago, No. 11 in 2007, No. 8 in 2006, and No. 10 in 2005.

All companies in the rankings are judged by the same criteria, the most important being financial strength and stability, size and growth rate. Also considered: number of years in business, length of time franchising, start-up costs, litigation, percentage of terminations and financing options.

The factors are plugged into a Franchise 500 formula, with each eligible company receiving a cumulative score.

Location, location, location

MIDI plc, which is handling the development and restoration projects at Tigné Point in Sliema and Manoel Island, has announced a bond issue equivalent to e30 million and with a further €10 million in case of over subscription. Subscriptions open on Tuesday. With the bad news flowing in from all around, this has come as unexpected show of confidence in the Maltese economy. MIDI’s chairman ALBERT MIZZI elaborates on the subject.

Albert Mizzi sits in the boardroom of MIDI’s offices in Manoel Island and answers the question as to whether this is the right time for a bond issue when the last few months have repeatedly brought news of financial disaster elsewhere. “On the contrary, this is the perfect time for a good, solid company to issue bonds,” he says. “The chaos and uncertainty in financial markets overseas means that many Maltese investors are bringing their money back into Malta, and looking for good investment instruments.”

Albert Mizzi has great faith in real estate, and MIDI plc’s core business is development. “For more than 40 years I have invested in good sites and excellent projects, selling and moving on where necessary. I know what I’m talking about,” he says. He has been involved in the MIDI consortium since day one, and was in fact the person who brought all the investors together and persevered in making it work, even when others dropped out of the arduous exercise, which took eight years and dealings with three different governments. “I was convinced it could work,” he says, “even when others gave up hope that this project would ever get through. It got going because I and my other partners believed in it. I did not give up on it. My private company started out with 10 per cent shareholding in the MIDI consortium and now holds 18 per cent. We had people who wanted to get out when governments came and went and nothing was concluded, and I bought them out.” The investors in MIDI plc are now Alf. Mizzi & Sons Ltd, Bank of Valletta plc, Middle Sea Valletta Life Assurance Co Ltd, Fortress Developments Ltd, Investors Ltd, Vassallo Builders Group Ltd, Pater Holding Co Ltd, Gatt Investments Ltd, Polidano Brothers Ltd, Gee Five Ltd, Lombard Bank, First Gemini plc and Pininfarina Extra srl.

It was the famous dictum ‘location, location, location’ which drove Mr Mizzi’s conviction. “There’s no way around that fact,” he says. “Location is a matter of all or nothing. It’s either desirable or it’s not. I knew that if the sites at Tigné and Manoel Island were not successful, then nothing would be. They are prime areas.” Building work has not yet begun on Manoel Island, for which a restricted low-rise marina project is planned. Instead, MIDI has spent the last few years restoring Fort Manoel after decades of neglect. “Manoel Island has the potential to be a jewel,” he says. “A marina village there will be beautiful – very restricted, low-key and concentrated in one particular area. We are not in a hurry, though we know that people are waiting and we continue to receive enquiries.”

The company has meanwhile forged ahead with the Tigne Point project in Malta, and the funds raised by means of the bond issue are to go towards its completion. So far, the sales situation there has met Albert Mizzi’s predictions of success: flats there are sold within weeks of coming onto the market, and for sums that have set the bar ever higher at the top end of the property market, which also includes Portomaso and a couple of other developments. When the most recently finished apartments were put up for sale at the beginning of last summer, 37 of a total of 59 were sold within 10 weeks, for e27 million.

Now that there is a slowdown in the Maltese property market, Mr Mizzi is unperturbed. Good sites remain in very short supply, he says, and the law of demand and supply ensures that the prices stay high and will continue to go up as demand increases and supply decreases. But is demand for these flats still high in the current situation? Yes, he says, because it is now pan-European, and Malta’s good sites can’t be expanded. “My approach is very simple,” he explains. “Good sites will never go down in price. Never. You may not sell your property investment today, but you will sell it tomorrow, and at a much higher price. You have to be patient. You have to be able to wait. This is not the business for those who want to turn their money around quickly. Property prices may plateau for a while, but in Malta they will always recover and be even stronger than before. It’s the same wherever there is consistent demand coupled with restricted supply and desirability of location, as with the capital cities of Europe. Malta isn’t a country so much as one extended capital city. The island is this size and you can’t make it a bigger size. The day will come when the whole of Tower Road in Sliema will be knocked down again and rebuilt to suit the exigencies of the future. That is progress and you have to accept it.”

Progress might also mean that nobody would mourn the pencil developments of the 1970s and 1980s on Sliema’s Tower Road if they are torn down at some point in the far future to be replaced by better-conceived projects over rather more than the area of a single old townhouse. It is unlikely that anyone will campaign for their protection.

Interested in more in formation regarding buying Property in Malta contact a reputable Real estate Agent that will be able to provide you with genuine advice.

This article was broght to you by Independent Online.