Updated list: The top 5 foreign investors in US real estate

Summary

Real Estate Without Borders: Episode Summary Title: Updated List: The Top 5 Foreign Investors in US Real Estate
Release Date: July 16, 2025
Host: Real Estate Without Borders (Dan & Dave)

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Introduction

In this insightful episode of Real Estate Without Borders, hosts Dan and Dave delve into the latest findings from the 2025 International Transactions in US Residential Real Estate Report by the National Association of Realtors (NAR). The discussion centers around the surge in foreign investments in U.S. real estate, identifying the top five foreign investor nations, their preferred U.S. destinations, purchasing behaviors, and the broader implications for the American real estate market.

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Surge in Foreign Investments

The episode opens with a striking statistic highlighting a 43% increase in foreign buyers of U.S. real estate from 2024 to 2025, as reported by NAR.

Dan (00:00): "There was a 43% increase in foreign buyers of U.S. real estate from 2024 to 2025."

However, Dan clarifies that this impressive growth stems from a previously low base, with foreign purchases totaling 78,000 homes in 2025, compared to 54,000 the previous year. For context, the peak was 285,000 homes in 2017.

Dan (02:48): "This year, China bought 13 billion, and Canada only bought 6.2 billion."

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Top Five Foreign Investors in US Real Estate

1. China

China currently stands as the largest foreign investor in U.S. real estate, holding 15% of the top 10 countries' share.

• Dollar Volume: Increased from $7 billion in 2024 to $13 billion in 2025.
• Number of Homes Purchased: Rose from 11,700 to 12,500.

Preferred U.S. States:

• California (36%)
• Maryland (9%)
• New York (9%)
• Hawaii (5%)
• Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana, North Carolina, Washington (4%)
• Arizona, Delaware, Florida (3%)

Dan (03:24): "China is buying the most real estate in the US right now as of 2025."

2. Canada

Canada closely follows China with a 14% share.

• Dollar Volume: Grew marginally from $5.9 billion to $6.2 billion.
• Number of Homes Purchased: From 10,900 to 11,000.

Preferred U.S. States:

• Florida (48%)
• Arizona (12%)
• California (9%)
• New York (5%)
• Texas, Louisiana, South Carolina (4%)
• Michigan, Pennsylvania, Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Missouri (5%)

Dave (07:36): "Canadians are the biggest sellers of US Property."

3. Mexico

Mexican investors hold the third position with a significant inclination towards Texas.

• Dollar Volume: Increased, details unspecified.
• Number of Homes Purchased: High concentration in Texas at 40%.

Preferred U.S. States:

• Texas (40%)
• Arizona (17%)
• Michigan (5%)
• Pennsylvania, Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Missouri (5%)
• South Carolina, Illinois (2%)

Dan (12:02): "Mexican foreign investors in U.S. real estate are buying predominantly in Texas."

4. India

India is emerging as a major investor, potentially set to surpass others in the next decade.

• Dollar Volume & Purchase Numbers: Balanced distribution with 13% across Texas, California, Arizona, and Indiana.

Preferred U.S. States:

• Texas, California, Arizona, Indiana (13% each)

Dan (14:32): "India is just, it's the next up and coming economy."

5. United Kingdom

The UK ranks fifth, with a strong preference for Florida.

• Dollar Volume & Purchase Numbers: Details indicate increased activity.

Preferred U.S. States:

• Florida (45%)
• California (18%)
• Mississippi (14%)
• Arizona (9%)

Dave (20:02): "They have a citizenship by investment program which attracts many investors."

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Foreign Buyers' Purchasing Patterns

All-Cash Purchases

Foreign buyers are more inclined to purchase properties with all cash compared to domestic buyers.

• Foreign Buyers: 57% all-cash
• Chinese Buyers: 71% all-cash
• Canadian Buyers: 57% all-cash
• Mexican Buyers: 49% all-cash
• Indian Buyers: 43% all-cash
• U.S. Buyers: 28% all-cash

Dan (32:54): "28% of American buyers buy with all cash, whereas foreign buyers have significantly higher percentages."

Property Types and Usage

A significant portion of foreign investments are directed towards specific property types and intended uses.

• Property Types:
  • Single Family Detached (60%)
  • Condos (15%)
  • Townhouses (14%)
  • Residential Land (5%)
  • Others (3%)

Dan (35:05): "For all foreign buyers in the U.S., single-family detached homes account for over 60%."

• Usage:
  • Vacation Homes or Rentals (47%)
  • Investment (33%)
  • Primary Residence (22%)
  • Both Vacation and Rental (20%)

Dave (43:17): "The biggest reason for Americans looking abroad is vacation homes."

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Challenges and Failed Transactions

A notable 69% of foreign investors decided not to purchase U.S. properties in 2025.

Top Reasons for Not Purchasing:

1. Could Not Find a Property (Top Reason)
2. Cost of the Property
3. Couldn’t Get Financing
4. Immigration Laws (18%)
5. Condo Maintenance Fees (16%)
6. Insurance Costs (15%)
7. Property Taxes
8. Exchange Rate Exposure
9. US Tax Laws
10. Loss of Home Country Benefits

Dave (39:40): "It's crazy that the biggest reason someone didn't buy is because they couldn't find a property."

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Selling Properties in the U.S. by Foreign Investors

There has been a significant increase in foreign investors selling U.S. properties, particularly Canadians.

• Percentage of Realtors Reporting Sales: 20% had international clients who sold properties.
• Top States for Selling:
  • Florida (23%)
  • California (14%)

Dan (41:34): "Canadian investors are the largest sellers of U.S. properties."

Reasons for Selling:

• Retirement Funding
• Portfolio Unwinding
• Political Issues

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Americans Investing Abroad

16% of U.S. Realtors reported that their clients are looking to purchase properties outside the U.S.

Primary Reasons:

1. Vacation Homes (25%)
2. Rental Properties (24%)
3. Primary Residences (22%)
4. Both Vacation and Rental (20%)

Top Destinations for U.S. Investors:

• Mexico (8%)
• Grenada (7%)
• Canada (6%)
• Portugal (5%)
• UK, Australia, Costa Rica (4%)
• Dominican Republic, Italy, Spain (3%)

Dave (44:09): "Grenada is gaining traction due to its citizenship by investment program."

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Impact of Foreign Investment on Local Markets

The hosts discuss the double-edged sword nature of foreign investments:

• Positive Impacts:

  • Economic Growth: Increased capital circulation, higher taxes, improved infrastructure, more jobs.
  • Property Value Increases: Especially in high-demand areas.

• Negative Perceptions:

  • Housing Affordability: Foreign investors often purchase higher-end properties, leading to price inflations.
  • Gentrification: Local residents may feel displaced or priced out.

Dan (26:38): "It's a double-edged sword, bringing both economic benefits and challenges in affordability."

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Future Predictions and Closing Thoughts

Dan and Dave emphasize the importance of responsible immigration policies to sustain economic growth without exacerbating housing market issues.

Dan (29:46): "Responsible immigration policies can lead to good outcomes."

They also highlight Italy's potential to become a major player in the foreign real estate market, predicting significant growth in the next decade.

Dave (36:14): "I think Italy has the best bull case for anywhere on earth right now."

The episode concludes with a call for listener engagement, inviting suggestions for future topics and guest experts to enrich the show's content.

Dan (50:03): "If you know anybody in any country with a good real estate scene, connect us. We want to learn and share."

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Key Takeaways

• Foreign investment in U.S. real estate is growing, with China, Canada, Mexico, India, and the UK leading the charge.
• Preferred states among foreign buyers include California, Florida, Texas, and Arizona, each favored for unique regional advantages.
• Foreign buyers tend to pay higher median prices and often purchase properties with all cash, impacting local market dynamics.
• Challenges such as property availability and cost remain significant barriers for foreign investors.
• Foreign sellers, especially Canadians, are increasingly divesting from U.S. properties, influenced by economic and political factors.
• U.S. investors are increasingly looking abroad for vacation homes, rentals, and primary residences, with Mexico and Grenada emerging as top destinations.
• The impact of foreign investment is multifaceted, offering both economic benefits and challenges related to housing affordability and community dynamics.

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Notable Quotes

• Dan (00:00): "There was a 43% increase in foreign buyers of U.S. real estate from 2024 to 2025."
• Dave (07:36): "Canadians are the biggest sellers of US Property."
• Dave (39:40): "It's crazy that the biggest reason someone didn't buy is because they couldn't find a property."
• Dan (26:38): "It's a double-edged sword, bringing both economic benefits and challenges in affordability."
• Dan (50:03): "If you know anybody in any country with a good real estate scene, connect us. We want to learn and share."

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Conclusion

This episode of Real Estate Without Borders provides a comprehensive analysis of the current landscape of foreign investments in U.S. real estate. By uncovering the leading investor nations, their investment patterns, and the resultant market implications, Dan and Dave equip listeners with valuable insights to navigate the global property market. The discussion also underscores the importance of balancing economic growth with sustainable housing policies to ensure a thriving and inclusive real estate environment.

Transcript

[Dan]

Okay, so There was a 43% increase in foreign buyers of U.S. real estate from 2024 to 2025, according to NAR, the National association of Realtors. Not to be confused with the word no when our friend Dan Lee Plum says it on the show, which is Australian nar. Exactly.

[Dave]

What an intro. Welcome back, everybody.

[Dan]

Welcome back to Real Estate Without Borders. This is a show about the largest asset class in the world, which is global residential property markets and how to buy it anywhere in the world when you live anywhere else in the world. That's what the show's about. Pretty simple concept, to be honest, but.

[Dave]

Just, we're just letting people be more aware of incredible opportunities globally. And I think, like, we talk about this all the time, but this is such a hot topic. I think it's becoming so much more prevalent and people are looking for answers and thank God we have them.

[Dan]

Well, everybody left or right of the political spectrum is angry with their government right now. So they're. And like, and, and, and they have money finally, like, you know, like our, like, oh, we have some wealth. Like, let's go and buy property in other places. It's like, I don't think that a wave of interest in global investment of property and residency has ever existed like this. So it's true.

[Dave]

Even when, when we went to, like when my fiance and I went to Mexico and we're buying real estate in Mexico, it's like my, my mom thought that was like impo, you know, people even. It's crazy. I post all the time on my TikTok about purchasing property in Mexico and to some it just seems like so foreign and such a CR concept. And to be honest, I did too until I went through the process. And now like with some of the guests we've had on here, it just like international investing is the vibe, the 2025 vibe.

[Dan]

So let's talk. We're going to talk a lot about Mexico actually today. So Mexico was the. Is, is still the, the leading country in which Americans invest. So here's what we're going to go through today. Okay, we're going to go through the 2025 International transactions in US residential real estate report by the national association of Realtors in the US and we're going to cover, number one, we're going to cover who are the biggest investors in U.S. property. Number two, we're going to cover who are the biggest destinations where US Investors are taking their money to buy residential property, which is a really interesting insight that they've added to the report. We're going to talk about how much foreign investment is happening in the US because I said it was up. It's up 43%. But that actually comes from a really low base. Okay, it sounds big. It sounds like super crazy. Oh, there's this huge surge, 43% jump in international property purchases, but it's actually the second lowest number, if you pull up this chart, second lowest number of foreign buyer purchases in 13 years.

[Dave]

So this is, this is Americans purchasing foreign property outside of the U.S. no.

[Dan]

This is how many homes were purchased by foreign buyers in the US and it's 78,000, whereas last year it was 54,000. And so that's a big jump. But last year was really, really low base. To, to give you some context, the peak was in 2017 at 285,000.

[Dave]

Wow. And who does this say? Who's leading that? Are we gonna get into that? I'm.

[Dan]

Yeah, you wanna know? You want me to just answer the question?

[Dave]

Give me a, give me a number one. I just want number one, like who, what, what country was buying the most amount of real estate inside China? Wow.

[Dan]

China is buying the most real estate in the US right now as of 2025. If you look at it. I have a chart somewhere here. Yeah. So percent share of top 10 countries of origin to foreign buyer purchases, China is 15%. And Canada is just behind them at 14% of the top 10.

[Dave]

I was going to say Canada, but.

[Dan]

Okay, and now we can boil this down in a different way too, because last year China bought a higher value, like a higher total. So China bought. Last year it was 7 billion in real estate, and Canada bought 5.9 billion. Okay. This year, China bought 13 billion, and Canada only bought 6.2 billion. Now, but, but that's. So China is buying more expensive homes, let's say. So they've always, they've always been ahead of Canada as a foreign investor by dollar volume. But this is the first year in a couple of years where they were actually also ahead in the number of homes purchased. So China this year bought 11,700 homes in the U.S. chinese investors, not China and Canada bought. Canadian investors, bought 10,900 homes in the U.S. in 2020.

[Dave]

Okay. Now I'm assuming, I mean, we. Do, we have the chart on this too, but I would assume that a lot of this would be located like Florida, Arizona, California, places like that.

[Dan]

Yeah. So there is a breakdown, actually. So you want to know, you want to know what it is? Hey, we'll get right to it. Let's start with because it varies by group. Right. So we, we can go by the biggest recipients period, which we can do after. But let's start with these Chinese investors. So major destiny destinations of foreign buyers from China. Number one, California. 36% of all purchases by Chinese foreign investors are in California. They love California, man.

[Dave]

I get it.

[Dan]

Then the second one was kind of weird. It was kind of surprising. And I'm gonna. I have to ask ChatGPT, like, why is this number two. 9% in Maryland.

[Dave]

Maryland, yeah. 9% of Chinese investors are buying in Maryland. Let me get to this, Let me get to the bottom of this.

[Dan]

Gotta figure it out. Okay. Got Dave on the hunt on it. So it's still like, still a quarter of. Of what's happening in California. Okay, so we. 36% in California, 9% in Maryland, 9% in New York, 5% in Hawaii, 4% in Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana, North Carolina, Washington, 3% in Arizona, Delaware and Florida. Really big Florida guys.

[Dave]

They don't like.

[Dan]

I guess, I mean, I guess the flight as well is. It's a Pacific flight. So, you know, that might be it. California is really nice and Chinese people like nice things. Chinese foreign investors like nice things. They like that kind of metadata, Mediterranean, you know, it's a cool vibe. I don't know. Makes sense to me. Major destinations. Go ahead. Yeah, tell me, tell me all about. No, you go ahead. We'll go to Canada after.

[Dave]

Okay, I. This is what I got. This is from Chat GPT. So why are 9% of Chinese real estate investors looking in Maryland? I think, and I was going to say this before, but honestly, I'm horrible with geography, as we all know, if you listen to the show. Not a big geography guy. I actually have a friend who sells real estate in Maryland and it's a. He said that a lot of the people are living in Maryland because of its proximity to Washington. So.

[Dan]

Right.

[Dave]

It's saying here that. Right. Maryland hosts prestigious universities and as close to hubs like Washington, some investors choose U. S property, support children's education, which we've talked about with Henley and partners, to support children's education as a part of immigration strategies. Interesting. I think that's it. It's the proximity to D.C. so Maryland's closest to the UC capital means it's easy to access government agencies, international organizations, embassy jobs potential. It's got a strong local economy because it's home to federal contractors, lots of biotech universities, and it's obvious it's comparative affordability. So likely more accessible than the coastal properties like San Francisco, California Whatever. Interesting.

[Dan]

Very interesting.

[Dave]

Cool.

[Dan]

Okay, let's get to number two here. No surprises, but, I mean, still a shocking number of the concentration of real estate in Florida. Major destinations of foreign buyers from Canada, 48% purchased in Florida. 48%. Almost half of Canadian buyers of U.S. real estate are buying in Florida. Canadians, Remember what we've said, like, earlier on the show, like, do exactly the opposite of whatever Canadians are doing.

[Dave]

Yeah.

[Dan]

Look, this is a good example, man. Seriously. We suck at investing in real estate.

[Dave]

We do. We really do.

[Dan]

Getting smoked right now.

[Dave]

I actually had this conversation this morning with a guy in the gym. It's. It's crazy that, you know, we're. We're in real estate, and especially guys like you and I that we know, we have this podcast. We both live and breathe real estate, whether that's fortunately or unfortunately. And we're up to date on the stats. But most people, especially Canadians and I agree, we suck at investing in real estate. Most Canadians have no idea that Florida's getting rocked right now. Like, I have this conversation at least once a week with like, a. I don't want to say a crypto, bro, or like a. You know what I mean? Yeah. We live in Toronto, Right.

[Dan]

So it's at the gym this morning for context. Like, Toronto's like Miami but cold. It's like, just douche culture. Like bottle service.

[Dave]

Yeah. That's for those that don't know. And this guy was like, man, I told him about Mexico, how I'm living in Mexico, and he's like, yeah, what about Florida, man? I'm thinking about getting to Florida. Florida's crushing it. And I was like, you mean crashing it? Like, what do you mean?

[Dan]

I mean, like, that does make it a good place to invest. Like, I would. I want to be buying on the down. Not on personally, but, yeah, it's not. I wouldn't. I wouldn't say it's crushing it by any means. Like, you know, year over year, price appreciation. Like, I'm the type of person where a market becomes more compelling to me if it's falling. So, like, if I see 20% price crash in Florida, I'm, like, fired up to buy there. So. Kind of. But I think that they're reading it wrong, you know?

[Dave]

Right.

[Dan]

Which is very crypto, bro. It's like, oh, yeah, it's a red candlestick. Let's buy that shit.

[Dave]

You know, there's a bunch of charts on their Instagram, some lines and happy faces.

[Dan]

Oh, yeah.

[Dave]

Time to buy, baby.

[Dan]

That's it.

[Dave]

I think the Canadians are Just buying their. Honestly, just like purely based off of proximity and weather. Like. Yeah, don't get me wrong, I do enjoy Florida.

[Dan]

Well, like you just have such a high concentration, like a huge portion of the population of Canada. I think like a quarter of the population of Canada lives in like that 401 corridor. Right? So like GTA, Greater Toronto, Hamilton Area, 401 corridor all the way to like Montreal. And so that's who it is because same time zone, it's like a three hour flight. Like, it's like, it's like going to the cottage, you know, like. And so I think that's what this is driving this. Right. So you've got a huge portion of Canadians who just. That's the most logical place geographically for them to buy because most people are buying them for recreational properties, not for investment. We'll get to that too. But number two on the list of Canadian foreign buyer locations. Arizona is a quarter of Florida. And so that's probably capturing your, you know, your west coast, like your bc. I know a lot of BC people, like California, which is number three on the list. But like California, Arizona, you know, that's getting your Calgary and like. Yeah, BC people. Right, your Prairies and BC people. Because same thing, three hour flight from there. Whatever, same time zone.

[Dave]

It's cool because for those that don't really know like the. There's only two places to live in Canada. Don't, don't come for me. But there's the east coast, there's Toronto and Vancouver basically, you know, so it's like. Sorry, sorry.

[Dan]

Oh no, you're gonna try to get evicted for. You're gonna try go to get refugee status in the US after that one and they're gonna ban you here.

[Dave]

I love all of Canada. Right. But whatever, whatever. But I'm saying like this is the content. The most concentrated area is probably the GTA and, and the proximity to Florida and which we're going to touch on something else. And we talked about Mexico earlier, but that's why I think it's just due to pure proximity. Then you have the, the BC people and the west coast people all buying. And Arizona, California due to their proximity.

[Dan]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.

[Dave]

I love all of Canada.

[Dan]

48% Florida, 12% Arizona, 9% California, 5% New York and Texas, 4% Louisiana and South Carolina. This is where Canadians are buying real estate. 3% Maryland, Michigan, Maine, Nevada and then 1% North Carolina. That's Canadians should move on to the number three largest buyer of US real estate, Mexican foreign investors.

[Dave]

Interesting.

[Dan]

High concentration in Texas. I would have thought California, but Texas, I mean, obviously both share a border, but Texas. 40% of Mexican foreign investors in U.S. real estate are buying in Texas.

[Dave]

I would say 90, maybe not that high a percentage. Let's go like 70, 70 to 75% of my clients that, that buy real estate that are Americans that are buying real estate in Tulum or Quintana Roo State are Southern state Texan Americans with like dual citizenship or, or whatever. So it makes sense that they go back and forth and purchase real estate. And I mean, the, the price points in Texas are, are reasonable depending on what location you're at, I guess, compared to California anyways.

[Dan]

Yeah. So I think you're gonna see like kind of the states that border Mexico or close proximity to Mexico, obviously going to get the most of it. It's kind of surprising. Like number four on this list is surprising because you, you jump the whole country. We'll get to it. Okay, so Texas, 17%. Arizona, 10%. Those make sense. Michigan percent. Pennsylvania, Alabama. Alabama makes a bit of sense. Closer. Arkansas, Colorado, Missouri are all 5%. And then South Carolina, 2%. Illinois, 2%.

[Dave]

I cannot for the life of me figure out why Michigan is up there. I don't, I don't know.

[Dan]

I don't know.

[Dave]

It's cold there. We got to send out a notice to some of these Mexican buyers.

[Dan]

Ask your friends in Mexico when you're there.

[Dave]

Do you guys know it's cold there? Right? They're like, michigan sounds beautiful. I'll take it. Isn't the Detroit market making us a little bit of like a bounce back?

[Dan]

Yeah, I mean, it's. The city's improving for sure. I wouldn't say the market's getting better, but the city's definitely improving.

[Dave]

There you go.

[Dan]

Okay, this one is interesting to me because it's pretty balanced and this is the up and coming. Like, it would not surprise me if India ended up being one of the largest purchasers of U.S. real estate in the next decade. Or, sorry, potentially the largest. Like, I could see them passing Mexico, Canada and China within the next 10 years. India is just, it's the next up and coming economy. They're like, they're the most likely to go through the same kind of middle class renaissance period like China did. Right. Where they pull a bunch of people out of poverty. Major destinations of foreign buyers from India in the U.S. texas, California, Arizona, Indiana, all at 13%.

[Dave]

Very even.

[Dan]

Any of those, Any of those surprise you? Indiana.

[Dave]

Indiana, yeah.

[Dan]

NASCAR races?

[Dave]

Yeah. Yeah, that's the American Dream. They must be on the wrong side of Tick Tock or something. But yeah, Texas makes sense. Obviously. I think Texas. Everyone's talking about Texas just for their low tax purposes and nice people. I was just in Texas. I was just in Austin. California makes sense. Arizona makes sense. Indiana.

[Dan]

Somebody tell me.

[Dave]

I gotta Google this.

[Dan]

Send us a note. Leave us a review. Explain to us why Indian foreign investors are buying in Indiana. Maybe it says India in the title. I mean, I don't know.

[Dave]

Like, it's. Honestly, let's just keep the same kind of spelling.

[Dan]

I mean, when I was looking on Zillow once, I saw a place called Little Canada and I looked at it, you know, so I get it.

[Dave]

That's it. It's pretty. Like, even though across the top. Well, it is exactly even across the top four, which is interesting.

[Dan]

That's why it surprised me. Like, there's no clear preference with Indian foreign investment. It's very balanced.

[Dave]

They're going to the right spots.

[Dan]

Yeah.

[Dave]

Like, Texas is great. California's awesome. Arizona's got incredible golf. Awesome. Florida's great. North Carolina, good golf.

[Dan]

Yeah, good golf. Okay.

[Dave]

Yeah, but North Carolina, South Carolina. What's the. What's the major city in Charlotte? No. Charleston.

[Dan]

Is this where it's called? Dave Guess's geography again. Oh, that's. We're at. We're on that segment already.

[Dave]

Segment?

[Dan]

Yeah. That's the one with the TV show, right? With all those people.

[Dave]

Apparently. It's incredible.

[Dan]

The TV show or the. I've watched the show. It's not that incredible.

[Dave]

No.

[Dan]

I don't know offense if you're on this show.

[Dave]

Charleston. Charleston. Charleston, South Charleston, South Carolina.

[Dan]

Yeah, it's.

[Dave]

I know.

[Dan]

Yeah. It's like a historic.

[Dave]

Yes. One of my. One of my friends I went funny enough golfing with with her and her friend and my fiance, and it was like she was from Michigan. And I said, if you were me, and you could go anywhere in the US to relocate, like, for good, to raise a family, all the things I want. She's like, Charleston. And I was like, really? Charleston?

[Dan]

I think, Yeah.

[Dave]

I mean, it's on the water. What's.

[Dan]

What?

[Dave]

What is it on here? What. What body of water is this?

[Dan]

The good old ocean, bro. Yeah, but the big one.

[Dave]

Which one, though?

[Dan]

But the Atlantic, it's on. Do you not know what coast it's on? I love teaching you geography. I'm trying to Google outside of America.

[Dave]

My maps are glitching. There we go. Okay, I got it. Obviously, the North Atlantic makes sense.

[Dan]

Let's pull up Some Zillow here.

[Dave]

Yeah, let's get some. Oh yeah. Okay.

[Dan]

You can buy a boat slip for 80 grand. So that's cool.

[Dave]

I looked at all the photos. It looks really cool. I just don't know.

[Dan]

That's beautiful city. Beautiful.

[Dave]

Anyone. Anyone from Charleston's from her. However many listeners send me a dm.

[Dan]

So the hard part for. Yeah. So like this is like this is what you get for 330 grand U.S. it's like. I don't know man. It's like it's, that's not, it's not.

[Dave]

The vibe I'm looking.

[Dan]

It's just not, it's not like it's not cheap. Right. Like.

[Dave]

Right.

[Dan]

Not to say that everyone listening to the show needs to be looking for a cheap market, but I'm just saying like usually markets that are priced better tend, tend to move a little bit more for at least for investors and stuff like that. Right.

[Dave]

I mean I feel like it's affordability.

[Dan]

Is always in style.

[Dave]

I feel like Charleston's like an old money type of town just based off of what I see online.

[Dan]

Again, the one thing that I've found though there is that I think that there's not a lot of direct flights to from Canada there.

[Dave]

Interesting. That was actually another issue with Austin, Texas. If while we're on the topic of that there were no, there were not many direct flights in and out of Austin. Like for us to go from New York, we were already in New York. New York to Austin was a challenge and I just think that would be like for me I'm traveling all the time for work and it's like that would just be a. Absolutely not that bad.

[Dan]

I got it up here. You got, you got a bunch of non stop flights. Charleston. I don't know what I was talking about. Ignore me. Where were. Oh no, there's a bunch of connecting. That's why there's only two non stop flights.

[Dave]

Yeah. See that's not.

[Dan]

And they're like triple the price of.

[Dave]

Right.

[Dan]

Like Florida flights. Right. So that's probably why you're not seeing a lot of Canadian investors buying in that market. India. I mean if you're, if you're going, if you're coming from India, if you're buying this as a recreational or like property or like a vacation home, you already flying in probably to Atlanta and then connecting somewhere anyway. Right. Because I think Atlanta is the biggest airport in, in the US One of the biggest in the world by traffic.

[Dave]

Atlanta.

[Dan]

Yeah. Yeah. It's like the big. Because it's it's like the hub for a lot of those international flights that end up like, so they have like all the big, you know, jets come in and then they have all the connecting flights to send you all over the U.S. got it. I think it's also like the human trafficking capital of the world too, which.

[Dave]

Is a little dark, but that's not good. No. I'm trying to look up why Indian foreign buyers are purchasing in Indiana and I. There's really nothing that's standing out.

[Dan]

I'm just gonna guess that it's because it starts with India. And like, honestly, just because, like it would catch my eye. Like, I'm not even saying it like, to be funny or anything if I like, you know what I mean? Like, I don't know, it's like California has a town called Ontario and that's right. Reason. You know what I mean? Like, you know that, right? Like it's like it. And so it already starts you off a little bit further because you have like degree of interest or like connection with it. I know it's like, sounds dumb, but it could just be that simple.

[Dave]

It's given me nothing like, other than the fact that maybe real estate is a little bit cheaper, that that might be it. And, and they're saying that there are. It's like an up and coming tech hub a little bit, but like, I mean, not compared to anything else that we saw on the list anyways. Right. I guess we'll never know unless someone tells us.

[Dan]

Well, we're gonna, we're gonna find out. One of our listeners is gonna tell us for sure.

[Dave]

I love it.

[Dan]

I'm gonna ask some friends from India. We have a lot of Indian folks in, in Canada. I mean, lots of great people love them and I'm gonna ask them.

[Dave]

A lot of my clients ask. Toss out an email today. Mass, Mass email to my database.

[Dan]

This one actually surprised me because when I think of British people, I think of like a little bit more like. And maybe I'm wrong about Florida because I know Florida has a lot of wealth, but I also think of like Florida as like, you know, they like to get a little ratchet sometimes.

[Dave]

Of course.

[Dan]

Uk, the largest destination of foreign buyers from the United Kingdom, Florida by a large margin, 45. Then you've got California, 18. Mississippi, 14. Mississippi, Mississippi random. Arizona 9.

[Dave]

The lowest.

[Dan]

The lowest GDP per capita. It would be like on paper the poorest state. Yeah, right? Yeah.

[Dave]

Interesting. Florida.

[Dan]

Florida. That's it, man. Yeah.

[Dave]

Is this, are these, is this all from 2020? These are lists from 2024. Complete or literally, they.

[Dan]

They published it ago. So it's like from two days ago to like three back 365 days. So it captures like three quarters of 2020 or half of, like, they do it halfway through the year. So it captures half of 2024, half of 2025. So they call it the 2025 edition.

[Dave]

Got it. Interesting.

[Dan]

Yeah. Yeah. So there's some cool stuff here. Like the share of the top 10 states to total foreign buyer purchases. So the states that are leading where people are. For where foreign buyers are buying in the U.S. florida, leading at 21% of total foreign purchases. California, 15%. Texas, 10%. New York, 7%. Arizona, 5%.

[Dave]

Interesting.

[Dan]

Then Hawaii, North Carolina. So. And then you can actually go buy buy place as well. Foreign buyers in the top five states. So Florida's foreign buyer. Florida. Florida's region of origin of Florida's foreign buyers, 31% Latin America and Caribbean. So even though Canadians are buying a ton of Florida real estate, they're still, you know, I guess they're tied with the Latin American and Caribbean bid as well. Right. So 31% North America, 31% Latin America.

[Dave]

That makes sense. When you go to Miami half or Florida half the time, it's like a Spanish is. Is probably more prevalent than English.

[Dan]

Yeah, for sure. California. This is crazy. Okay. This one is, like, actually very standout.

[Dave]

Wow.

[Dan]

57% of foreign buyers in California are from Asia.

[Dave]

Wow. You know what? I haven't spent enough time in California, so I can't say much about it.

[Dan]

Dude, it's so beautiful. Ma'. Am.

[Dave]

I've only been there for work and conferences, like, being like, right downtown la, and it's like, that's. That's not a fair representation.

[Dan]

Yeah, for sure.

[Dave]

Interesting.

[Dan]

Yeah.

[Dave]

New York.

[Dan]

Yeah, New York. Region of origin of New York's foreign buyers, 46% Asia, 26% Latin America, 10% Africa and North America and 8% Europe. 10% Africa is pretty crazy. That's one of the first times you see Africa in the top three. Texas, same thing. 44% Latin America, 29% Asia, 12% Africa. So. And then 8% Europe. That's. Texas is the one state where North America, North American region of origin is the lowest.

[Dave]

Interesting.

[Dan]

Yeah.

[Dave]

And Latin Americans number one at a pretty big tilt, too.

[Dan]

Almost half crazy. Arizona, lots of North Americans. 30. That's the only one where North America leads, I think. Yeah, it is.

[Dave]

It's great golf.

[Dan]

That's it, man. All the golfers, all the little white boys. That's right, boys. Just going there to get dressed up and watch the Open.

[Dave]

That's right.

[Dan]

Region of origin for Arizona's foreign buyers, 33% North America, 26% Latin America, 26% Asia. Asia and Oceania, 15% Europe. Nobody from Africa, 0%.

[Dave]

Don't even put it on the chart. Then it's like. And Africa didn't buy anything there just.

[Dan]

In case you wanted insulting them.

[Dave]

Yeah.

[Dan]

Rude.

[Dave]

This is great.

[Dan]

Yeah. So median purchase price among foreign buyers versus all buyers.

[Dave]

This episode is so good. This is our best episode.

[Dan]

I'm just teaching Dave stuff.

[Dave]

This is the best.

[Dan]

I wish they released this report every day.

[Dave]

We need to do this episode every day of different places. This is perfect.

[Dan]

So all Foreign buyers pay 494,000 median price. You're all existing home buyers. So American home buyers, 408,000. So about K, K. Higher purchase price by foreign buyers than domestic buyers. This is where you see the things that we talked about in countries like Portugal. Why people, like, demonize foreign investors. They're like, oh, I gotta hate foreign investors. They're coming here and bidding up our properties. It's because they're buying more expensive properties. Right. So there's also a data skew. But they are like, it's not. Not wrong. Usually if you can afford to buy real estate in another country, you have money.

[Dave]

Right? Yeah, that's. That's where, like, this might be controversial. And I. And we talk.

[Dan]

Can't wait. I love when you preface with that. Let's go.

[Dave]

No, I just. I think, like, I understand because. And I Now, I'm not that I haven't been paying attention, but I've. On my social media feeds, I've been coming across something that's similar happening in Portugal now happening in Mexico City. I'm not sure if you've seen this.

[Dan]

Yeah, for sure.

[Dave]

Right?

[Dan]

And I mean, there was like. There's the. That girl. She's like, tick tock famous that moved to Mexico. And like, she's getting, like, threats from people saying, like, you'd calling her, like, gentrify her and stuff. Tara.

[Dave]

Tara. Yeah, Tara's cool. We talked Tara all the time.

[Dan]

Yeah, we should have her on the show, actually. But she's been taught, like, she's been like, posting about getting like, threats from someone in Mexico. Like, you know, so, I mean, look.

[Dave]

He'S a golfer, eh?

[Dan]

Yeah, he's a.

[Dave]

He wanted to play golf. She's like, oh, you guys should be. Because she talks with my fiance. I'm not gonna say where she lives, but she lives Close by. She was like, you and you're, you should play golf with my, my husband. And I was like, there's no way he's a pro. He's literally professional, like in the tour. And I was like, you think he's gonna want to play with me? Like, that would be the worst. To be fair.

[Dan]

I found like a lot of guys who are pros like still like playing the shitty golfers. Yeah.

[Dave]

You'd have a good time.

[Dan]

Yeah, well, and it's like, I don't know. It makes you grateful, right?

[Dave]

Yeah.

[Dan]

At least I'm not that guy.

[Dave]

Like, do you want any extra balls?

[Dan]

Yeah. He's like, yeah, because I haven't lost any yet. I still have a full sleeve actually. Bring on the court.

[Dave]

Good times. But okay, back to my controversial statement. I think that yes, it's challenging and yes, it's frustrating for the locals. I understand. But I also think a little bit like the real estate that the foreign buyers are buying are prob. May sometimes be properties that some of the locals wouldn't buy anyways. We're paying a premium for it. Not all, but some.

[Dan]

Well, here's the thing, man. It's like it's a double edged sword, right. It's good in such that it brings a lot to the local economy. And this is why you're seeing like I'm going to jump around a little bit here. So we're going to present the list of the most popular places for Americans to buy. And Portugal's really high on that list. Canada and Mexico lead the list. And you, and you're starting to see this kind of pushback. And, and no, like, and if you're in the US you can understand this. There's, there's a whole thing going on with immigration right now. Canada, the same thing. They just dropped immigration because there's been a ton of pushback. Most of the western world, you're seeing a big political pushback against mass migration. Right. That people want controlled, thoughtful immigration policies which like that is not unreasonable. Okay. Like, you know, it's like, hey, can we just like do this pro properly? Like nobody's saying, I mean not, not a lot of people, I would say like the majority of people aren't saying like we hate X group of people. We're, you know, like there's no, it's not rooted in racism or like anti immigrant sentiment for the most part. But the, A lot of countries in the western world need to grow their population through immigration. Mexico isn't one of them. It's one of the countries that is still growing, although it's below the replacement rate, it's still growing faster than other places on earth. But if you want your economy to continue growing indefinitely, you need more consumers. Unfortunately, the version of capitalism that we created requires perpetual growth. And so either you, your country goes into deflation like you've seen in Japan, Italy, etc. And this is where when I said I was going to jump around when I posted this, Tim and Alessandro, I tagged them both the guys who have been on the show from Portugal and one, well actually I think they both live in Portugal and Spain, but they were saying they expect Italy to pass Portugal on the list and I totally agree. So the question becomes like why? What's going to cause that? Right? And, and the big thing is Italy is they're backed into a corner. They literally have to grow their population from immigration. It's the only way that their, their economy will grow for the next several decades. And it's hard, it's a hard sell to the population to say, oh we gotta let a bunch of people in. But go look at like what happened to Greece's economy post global financial crisis. Brain drain. All the doctors and everybody were leaving no jobs, you know that like, and the country lost a decade. Japan, same thing, right? Japan lost decade for 10 years. Don't get me wrong, like they were able to make a good high quality of life for people and all these other things. But most people don't want that like that stack to be exist in an economy with that stagnation. So I agree with, with these guys thesis and I think that unfortunately if you want your economy to grow, it's a necessary evil. It comes with the consequence of, you know, the cost of stuff going up. Rents are going to go up, prices are going to go up. But that means that there's more money. That, that's the result of that is there's more money circulating in the economy which means wages are going to go up, there's more jobs, there's more people consuming stuff, right. There's more capital in that country, more people paying taxes, which means your roads and police and all of the things that you pay taxes for are going to get better. It's double edged sword in that way. It sucks, but it also doesn't suck. Yeah, thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

[Dave]

No, dude, I think you crushed that. Like, correct me if I'm wrong to like summarize it, responsible immigration policies, yes, that was my cat.

[Dan]

But responsible, responsible immigration policies can lead to good outcomes. I mean Interestingly, like, to tie this back to Miami, there was this study done by a Canadian economist named David Card. So Miami has, like, the best case study on this because of this thing called the Mario Boat Lift. Do you know what this was?

[Dave]

The Mario Boat Lift? I do not.

[Dan]

Marielle Boat lift. So there's a. You know, like, you. Did you watch Griselda, that show Griselda on Netflix about the, like, Colombian drug lord, the godmother, whatever your name was.

[Dave]

No, no, but I need.

[Dan]

Yeah, it's dope. Sick show. Sophia Vergara. And anyway, she hires these people called Maritos, and they. They all were criminals. So what happened, like, in. I don't know, when it was like, the 70s or 80s, Castro basically said to all of the criminals, like, just, if you. You can be free, we're gonna put you on a boat and you go to America. So they were sending, like, boatloads of, like, hundreds of thousands of people who had been convicted of crimes and were in jail to America as well as other people. Like, basically anybody, if anybody wanted to leave America or, sorry, leave Cuba and go to America, they were. They would just ship them to. And Miami is not far from Cuba, so.

[Dave]

Right.

[Dan]

They just dropped them there. So you had, like, I think it was like a 7% increase in the labor force of the Miami. In, like, instantly. Okay. And there was almost no measurable impact, negative impact on wages. And there were other more positive outcomes. Right. Again, more spending, et cetera. So this has been documented that if it's. It's not always necessarily a bad thing. It's just an easy kind of boogeyman, political boogeyman for people to choose.

[Dave]

I get it. I agree. What a segment. What a segment. That was a great segment. So that's what we're trying to talk about when we say median prices are a bit higher for foreign buyers. To wrap it up in a nutshell. Ten minutes later, the Dave and Dan show.

[Dan]

You know, something like that. Yeah.

[Dave]

The joke in the office that me and Dan work at and run is we both love to chat. That's why we have this podcast. This is just that you guys are all just a byproduct of me and Dan get venting.

[Dan]

Say, like, dudes will. Dudes will like, literally start a podcast before going to get therapy. Like, that's pretty much it. Is that the meme.

[Dave]

We just love real estate so much that we have to make a podcast to talk about it, because our partners.

[Dan]

It's just like a class, classically douche thing to, like, love the sound of your own voice enough to be like, everyone needs to hear what I have to say. Somebody gave me a microphone. It's like funny when you post like a dumb take on TikTok. Like the comments are always like, podcast equipment needs to be more expensive. Yeah, dude, I get it all the time. King of dumb takes on TikTok.

[Dave]

So stuff.

[Dan]

Okay, let's jump over to another stat here. Foreign buyers are buying with all cash, substantially more than existing home buyers. Existing home buyers, about 28% of them buy with all cash. That means no mortgage.

[Dave]

I wonder. I wonder. Sorry to cut you off. I wonder if they're saying all cash. I wonder. There's probably no way to ever verify if they're like pulling funds, right? No.

[Dan]

Yeah, you wouldn't, you wouldn't know if they have debt elsewhere. You could, you could make the assumption that a large portion of them probably do. Yeah.

[Dave]

Yeah. Okay, so what's the one below? What was 28 that I do have?

[Dan]

28 is all, is is your domestic buyers. So your American buyers of American homes.

[Dave]

Interesting. Yeah, that makes sense.

[Dan]

28% all cash. Yeah. And then China coming in, leading the, leading the pack with all cash purchases. 71% of Chinese buyers, all cash, baby. Tons of wealth coming out of China into the US UK, 61%, Canada in the middle of the packet, 57%, Mexico 49% and India 43% all cash.

[Dave]

India's getting there.

[Dan]

I mean I, I've never really understood the, the idea of buying real estate all cash. Like to me one of the best things about real estate is that it is a easily leverageable product. Right, right. That's another double edged sword. It burns you. You know, it's great to improve your yield, but it's also way more risk because you have debt. But if you responsibly use leverage, real estate can be a great asset. Percentage of foreign buyers who purchase a property for use as a vacation home rental property or for both, 47%. So the majority, or almost, almost 50%, we're doing it as a vacation home or rental property. Whereas for US buyers, only 16%.

[Dave]

That's like a US buyer, let's say someone in New York buying a vacation property in Florida. I think that's going to go even lower. This like if, if we. I can't wait for NAR 2026. NAR 2026.

[Dan]

We're putting in your calendar, man.

[Dave]

Everybody lock in. July 16, 2026. Gonna be a big day.

[Dan]

Huge day. Dave's gonna write the report for next year. Percent of foreign Buyer purchases for vacation or investment. Rental by type. So only 60% of non residents, 36% increasing portion of resident foreign investors. So residents are people with a visa, which is an interesting stat.

[Dave]

That's kind of cool. Tying it back to when we had Henley and Partners on, I think, just becoming more and more popular.

[Dan]

This one's super interesting, actually. The type of property purchases by a type of foreign buyer. Because Canada actually stands out here to me. Okay. Vast majority of residential property purchases by type of foreign buyer. Single family detached. Over 60%.

[Dave]

Over 60% is residential detached.

[Dan]

Yeah. For all foreign buyers in the U.S. townhouses, 14%. Condos, 15%. Residential land, 5%. And then other 3%. Now, if you break this down by country is 71%. 71% of the stuff China's buying is detached houses. The only people who are buying more detached houses as a percentage of total than them is Mexico, 73%. Canada is buying the lowest number of detached houses, 54%. And that's almost entirely backfilled by townhouses. Canada is buying way more townhouses. I think it's in the U.S. anyone else? It's just Florida. I think that's Florida. It's like. Yeah, not a condo townhouse. Like all these, like, Tampa townhouse developments.

[Dave]

Right. I feel like also the. Maybe I'm crazy here, but I feel like we, as Canadians are. Our dollar is a lot weaker, so we're able to afford a lot less, which probably prices us out. Some of us, the average investor prices us out of the detached market. And places like China and Mexico, maybe not so much. And I also think condos are not as common in Mexico. It's more common for people to live in a house than a condo in Mexico, in my opinion.

[Dan]

Right. Fair. Yeah. And then condos, like, pretty small portion for everybody. Mexico is literally either detached or condo. 18% condos. That's really the only one that stands out to me. The location is. This is the highest year where the location was in central cities or urban areas. And it's been steadily increasing. But before it was more suburban. But urban areas are creeping up. So you're getting to 40% of all purchases. Cities are urban areas. 44% suburban, and that's why. And that's the lowest suburban since like 2019, I think. I don't know. I mean, the world is urbanizing, man. Like, I think something like 80% of the world's population, 70% of the world's population is supposed to live in. In urban areas by. Within the, like by 2050 or something. Like that. Yeah. I don't know. I mean like think about it. If you're like a foreign investor for or like looking for recreational property or something, like, I don't know, you, you kind of end up going to those like, those like Hallmark, you know, locations. La, Miami. Right. Major city names like just because again, it's kind of like back to that Indiana thing. It's like you pick a city where on the map where you start your search that you actually know the name of. Right, right. It's like the discovery process of like suburban markets for someone who doesn't live in another like in that country is probably pretty difficult. Right.

[Dave]

Great point.

[Dan]

Yeah. Canadians and Chinese investors are buying more suburban. 55% China. And in, in Canada it's like 51% suburban and only 22% urban.

[Dave]

I feel like like Canadians, just due to proximity to the U.S. maybe we're more familiar. We have friends or family or maybe that might be a reason. But China, I don't know.

[Dan]

Yeah. Canadians also have the highest percentage of resort area at 17. Everybody else is basically that doesn't even measure on their chart. So that's kind of interesting.

[Dave]

Resort area. What's that like? I guess like.

[Dan]

Yeah, like one of those like kind of like coastal resort areas. You know.

[Dave]

Canadians love that.

[Dan]

Oh, they just love it, man.

[Dave]

They're nerve or nervous people. We want to go into a gated area where no one can come in or out unless we got guards and we want to sip a drink and have a mid subpar food for a week and then go back to Canada.

[Dan]

Yeah, for sure. This one's interesting. So now we're going to jump over to whether if people decided not to buy. Okay. Like failed transactions. Because there's a new record that was set for the number of people who decided not to purchase U.S. properties. Foreign buyers who decided not to purchase U.S. properties in 2025 was 69% who had a client who decided not to purchase a U.S. property that was a foreign investor. Okay. The biggest reasons for that couldn't find a property. The cost of the property. Couldn't get financing. Which is interesting from the credit environment perspective. Big increase on that from last year. That was the only one that went up in the top list here. Top three. Everything else. Couldn't find it or the cost came, actually came down compared to 2024. Immigration laws number four on the list. 18%. Yeah. Condo maintenance fees, 16%. That's probably a lot of. That's Miami with those new. But they've, they're changing that now. A little bit not. Sorry, not Miami, South Florida. They're changing a lot of those now. They're making it. So there's some. They've realized that there's a huge crisis so they're trying to fix that. Insurance costs 15% similar kind of thing. Property taxes can't move money. Exchange rate exposure to US tax laws and loss of home country benefits are the biggest reasons why people go back.

[Dave]

To the top three for a second. So the first number one is could not find a property to purchase. Like that's such a crazy. What a, what a missed opportunity for our industry, honestly, for sure. You know what, what do you mean that we have AI that can do everything and anything for you and people can't find a property. Like it's crazy to me that they're, they're, it's not. And I think this is going to continually shrink, obviously drastically, especially at the pace of where, you know, technology is going. But it's like that to me, honestly blows my mind that there's a, the biggest reason someone didn't buy is because of the inability to find a property. That's crazy. And then number two, I wanted to. The cost of the property. I feel like, I feel like a lot of foreign buyers maybe have unrealistic expectations of certain properties in certain locations. And then when they find out the realities of those and plus like the different, you know, fees to purchase, they're like, wow, like I'll just speak for Mexico. People come to Mexico and think like properties are like 20 bucks, you know, and then you find the reality and they're like crap. But anyways, I think that's kind of interesting. That number one is, is definitely interesting.

[Dan]

Crazy. 20% of us realtors actually had a international buyer client, which is interesting. It's down from the peak of 2014, 2015, kind of post global financial crisis. There was obviously a lot of money trying to scoop up that cheap US real estate. But it's climbing again. 20% up from 15% the year prior. This is a crazy chart, man. This is probably the craziest chart in the report. Yeah. Percent of respondents who reported international clients who sold residential properties in the U.S. sorry.

[Dave]

Percent of respondents who.

[Dan]

The real, like the realtors, the NAR realtors. 10% had people who sold.

[Dave]

So they sold a property in the US to purchase outside of the country.

[Dan]

Or to do whatever. Like they, but they sold it. They're exiting right there. So there's a huge increase in, in foreign investors selling properties in the US Crazy.

[Dave]

I can, I, I get That I actually, I think that's a lot to do with maybe political issues.

[Dan]

It could be. I feel like that, like, because this report captures half of last year as well, though. Like, it's really only a couple months of this year that, you know, so, like, it could. It could be a big portion of it. But it is interesting because Canadians are the biggest sellers of US Property. I have. I made a chart of it here historically. Look at that. That's Canada on the left there.

[Dave]

Wow.

[Dan]

Into China, the biggest. China beat Canada one year. I think it was 2017. No, 20. I don't know what year that Canada sold or China sold more properties than Canada. Otherwise, Canada is by far the biggest seller of U.S. properties. And I think a lot of that's age. Like, you know, it's a lot of boomers who are starting to unwind those. Those portfolios and, you know, maybe not travel as much or at least, like, not be owners, unlock some of the cash to fund retirement and maybe just rent a place or whatever. But I found that pretty interesting because they have a chart here and the top states where international clients sold properties. Florida is leading by a long shot, 23%. Almost double the next one, which is California. Only 14% of them sold. Now we're going to get to Americans searching outside of America. We've obviously covered a lot of that on the show. I think probably more popular than us talking about foreign investors or places to Invest in the US is where Americans can invest outside the US 16% of realtors in the US reported that they had a client in the US looking for properties abroad. And the biggest reason for that is vacation home. The second biggest reason is as a rental property. And the third biggest reason is a primary residence.

[Dave]

What's the percentages of those?

[Dan]

Like, what's 25% vacation home, 24% residential rental property, 22% primary residence, and then 20% both vacation and rental. So you kind of like, you know, you use it as your vacation home, but you Airbnb it as well.

[Dave]

Interesting. That's kind of what I expected, to be honest. If anything, I. I thought vacation plus rental would maybe be number one. I think that that's super common. That makes sense.

[Dan]

Yeah, for sure it does. There was another thing on that. There was a. There. Oh, here. Percentage share of homes where they're looking. I made a chart out of this. But the areas where US Investors are looking the most. Number two surprised me, actually, quite a bit. And it just. It's like one of those places that just seems to appear randomly like, it's only like last. It was last year. And then as well. Mexico was number one. 8%, Grenada, 7% and then Canada, 6%.

[Dave]

We talked about this in the past and I, I'm having a hard time remembering why they're looking at Grenada.

[Dan]

So Canada, Australia, the U.K. portugal and Grenada saw an increase in U.S. homebuyers last year, while Mexico and Costa Rica both saw sharp decreases.

[Dave]

Which one saw a decrease?

[Dan]

Sorry, Mexico and Costa Rica. Mexico still leads. Yeah, look at this chart here. Mexico's still the highest, but it, it has dropped off pretty substantially since 2024.

[Dave]

Big time.

[Dan]

Canada's up kind of gradually, but it's so in, in order. Mexico, Grenada, Canada, Portugal.

[Dave]

Interesting. That. So Costa Rica went from number two to number what, seven?

[Dan]

Yeah, well, they were number two in 2023. And then. Yeah. Or sorry. No, no, sorry. They were number two in 2024.

[Dave]

Crazy.

[Dan]

And Australia was number two in 2023. Is now tied for. And then you've got. I didn't put Italy on this, but Italy's up there as well. And, and the guys, again, the Tim and Alessandro who came on the show, we're going to have them on, hope to have them kind of as regular guests here. But they, they both said that they expect Italy to pass or pass. So Italy was about 3%. So, so I'll go, I'll finish the list here. So you've got Mexico, 8%, Grenada, 7%, Canada, 6%, Portugal, 5%, UK 4%, Australia, 4%, Costa Rica, 4%, Dominican Republic 4%, Italy, 3% and Spain, 3%. That's your top 10 countries where US buyers are looking for residential property.

[Dave]

I got a reason why Grenada is crushing it. So they have a citizen citizenship by investment program. So basically it's like Grenada Citizenship by investment program allows investors to obtain Grenadian citizenship and that's a second passport by purchasing approved real estate at a minimum of 270,000 USD and maintaining that property for at least 5 years.

[Dan]

Makes sense.

[Dave]

Yeah. And I guess their, their tourism's doing well.

[Dan]

And Grenada had a big jump in 2020 as well, which was probably because of COVID Right, People. It's close by. It's beautiful. You know, makes sense.

[Dave]

Low property taxes, typically between 0.5 and 0.8%. And no taxes on foreign income, no taxes on capital gains or inheritance. So it's very tax efficient jurisdiction for global investors, for sure.

[Dan]

Amazing.

[Dave]

Cool.

[Dan]

Okay, Any closing remarks, thoughts here on, on this report? Dave?

[Dave]

No, that was cool. That was a good. This is my favorite episode. I think that we've done in a while. I like going through this stuff. I think it's important for. It's important for Realtor. I know a lot of our listeners are maybe divided between investors and real estate professionals that have investor clients. And I think it's super important or.

[Dan]

Just like regular buyers, but the majority, 70% of buyers consider their home an investment. So there's that.

[Dave]

Yeah, we're investors, you know, but I, I think it's super important to stay up to date and stuff like this because these little, these little signs and telltale, like, you know, future predictions, what's happening or what's happening in the market is so important just to make a better educated decision on, on everything. But that was, that was a good time. I really enjoyed this episode.

[Dan]

Same, dude.

[Dave]

It's fun.

[Dan]

For those of you listening, thank you for your attention to this matter. Please share this show with your friends, share it with your boss, post it in your team, your team's chat at work, whatever. I don't, I don't really care, but I would just appreciate if you hit the subscribe button, leave us a review. 5 star review, preferably with some good feedback. We've got good feedback, we got bad feedback. You know, like, we used to accidentally talk over each other a lot on the show.

[Dave]

Quality.

[Dan]

Yeah. But I heard Starlink just made some upgrades, so maybe we'll actually be able to record when Dave's in Mexico next time. But I think, I think we're getting a place in Italy. That's what I heard. Let's go. I literally texted Tim today. I was like, dude, where's the checkout card for your thing? Like, I need. I don't. Like. So I like, I'm a big Bieber fan. Don't tell anyone, but yeah, Bieber's in Mexico right now or no, in Italy. And I'm like, fricking, I gotta go. I gotta, I gotta get a place before this guy makes Mexico. Italy or Italy. Sorry, I keep saying Mexico. I feel like these guys are right, man. Like, I honestly think Italy has like the best bull case for anywhere on earth right now. Like easy 3-5x property values. I know it sounds completely ridiculous, but I'm talking about, like, if you buy some of these crappy, like $20,000 houses in Italy, I'm gonna get Tim to find me one of these suckers, man.

[Dave]

Dude, let's go in. I swear to God, I'm. I'm super in. Let's go.

[Dan]

I want a big ass piece of land though, man. Like an olive farm or something like that. Oh, yeah, or like a winery. Okay, Dave, I'm down. If anybody wants to buy a place in Italy with us, we'll maybe take like five partners max. And you have to be like, really nice, no bs. Like, I don't want you asking for your money out of the deal. Yeah, in five years. Like long haul, man. 10, 25 year hold. I'm gonna retire there, just smoke European cigarettes and sip. I don't know.

[Dave]

What's the Negronis?

[Dan]

Yeah, well, I don't drink, but maybe I will when I'm 80.

[Dave]

What's a burger?

[Dan]

Way less to lose then.

[Dave]

Yeah, we appreciate everybody listening, honestly. If you guys have anything you want us to cover on the show or, or, you know, any feedback, please.

[Dan]

Yeah, or guests. We love guest recommendations. Most of the guests that we've had on the show have been recommendations, actually. Like, you know, people are like, yeah, talk to this guy. You gotta talk to that guy. So, I mean, we like that. We appreciate it. And if you. So if you know an expert in a local market, I think we have somebo coming up from Dubai. And then we'll probably talk to Tara, I think too. Hey. About Mexico and her experience. And then we're going to keep trying to cover. I mean, we had a guy, one of the. We had another guy for Japan, but he hasn't. He. We got to reschedule him. But we've done. I mean, we've done Africa, we've done. We got to do some more countries in Asia, I think would be cool.

[Dave]

Yeah, that'd be really cool. I agree.

[Dan]

Eastern Europe would be cool too.

[Dave]

Eastern Europe would be Poland, specifically.

[Dan]

Yeah. Let's do it. Start putting call outs on Twitter.

[Dave]

Let's go.

[Dan]

Yeah. If you know anybody in any country where it's cool, they got a good real estate scene and you feel like it's a good opportunity to invest. I'd love to hear from you and. And connect us because we want to give them a platform and we want to hear, we want to learn like that. This whole show is literally just Dan and Dave learn about real estate around the world mostly. And Dave learns geography at the same time.

[Dave]

That's right. It's just a fun podcast. We're having a good time for sure.

[Dan]

Okay, well, thanks, everyone. See you next week.