Has the Spanish Property Market Bottomed out yet?

The Spanish property market is now coming to the end of its fifth year in recession, and as with all previous slumps (the last one occurred in the early nineties), there comes a time when property prices stop falling, the market stabilises, and a certain confidence returns attracting once more a desire to purchase a property in Spain.

Upon reading the endless statistics from many official and unofficial sources it would appear that prices in Spain have fallen, on average around 40% across the board. If you listen to the banks in Spain, the reduction is even greater, perhaps as much as up to 60% when you buy one of their re-possessed properties. And just recently there have been reports that the Spanish banks are up to their old tricks in offering 120% mortgages to buyers of their properties in order to cover al the purchasing expenses.