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Feb. 2, 2007
Israel's Euro housing boom
French, British Jews driving huge market in Mediterranean towns.
RHONDA SPIVAK
A year ago, when my husband and I bought an apartment in Netanya,
Israel, the city of approximately 200,000 was preparing for a boom
of unprecedented proportions.
The coastal city, which lies about halfway between Tel-Aviv and
Haifa, was dotted with construction crews. Large signs were marketing
a whole new section of the town called South Beach, to be made up
of high-rise luxury condominiums with views to the sea, new commercial
areas and new hotel developments.
"In the next few years, Netanya is going to double in size,"
Sarah Rubinstein, an optimistic local real estate agent, told me.
"The existing city will be known as the old city of Netanya
and South Beach, where all the municipal offices will eventually
be relocated, will be known as the new city."
As we looked at more than 50 projects and seafront apartments in
a period of three weeks, the facts on the ground seemed to confirm
Rubinstein's enthusiasm. Construction crews were working everywhere,
in South Beach, the centre of town and on Nitza Boulevard, where
the 36-storey Sea Opera Tower with luxury apartments has changed
the Netanya skyline. Significantly, most of the buyers for the myriad
new building projects are Jewish foreign residents from France and
Britain.
What has been propelling this buying frenzy, with skyrocketing prices?
The ongoing increase in anti-Semitism in both countries has made
Jews there, particularly those who are traditional and go to synagogue,
feel less and less secure. In France, some Jews have even taken
in their mezuzot and nailed them up inside. Those who can afford
it are buying "safe houses" in Israel, some with future
plans to move there permanently. In the two years prior to our buying
our apartment, the values for foreign resident luxury condominiums
went up by approximately 25 per cent.
With its sandstone cliffs, beautiful shoreline and large promenade,
Netanya has long been a favorite resort destination for French Jewish
tourists. On the streets of Netanya, I saw sign after sign of advertisements,
many exclusively in French, marketing new condominium projects with
names such as La Mer, the Riviera and the Duet, all designed to
attract the French buyer. Virtually all of the new projects contain
a Sabbath elevator and a synagogue within the building, which appeals
to traditional French and British Jews.
On the street in Netanya, the presence of French influence can be
felt everywhere, from the fact that salade niçoise is an
item on practically every restaurant menu to the not unusual site
of women walking little French poodles. There is even a man who
sells crêpes on Sironit beach, and morning coffee is often
served with a croissant in the town square. In Netanya's Carmel
Hotel, it is impossible to find any events guides in English, only
French (and sometimes Hebrew!). On several occasions, I was asked
by French tourists where I was from. When I said I was from Canada,
the response I invariably got was, "Oh, from Montreal."
They were always disappointed when I answered, "No, I'm from
Winnipeg."
A slick Israeli real estate agent from Re-Max told us, "Everything
here is changing – French Jews are coming to Israel, often
for only three or four days, putting down a deposit on a condominium
and then flying back to France, leaving their lawyers to finish
the deal."
The flight from France to Israel is only four hours. As a result,
there are even several hundred French immigrants to Israel who "commute"
back and forth between France and Israel. These French Jewish businessmen,
accountants and doctors fly back to France, where they make good
money, for the work week, and then return to Israel before the Sabbath
or, alternatively, work one week in France and then spend the next
in Israel.
France's 600,000 Jews are by far Europe's largest Jewish community.
About 30 per cent of France's Jews are Orthodox and generally right-wing
in their political make-up, and comprise the pool of most likely
immigrants to Israel. About 3,000 French Jews immigrated to Israel
last year, but more than 20,000 are in the system and have decided
to make aliyah in the coming years. In addition to those who are
immigrating, many other French Jews are buying second homes in Israel
or contemplating doing so. As the Muslim population of six million
in France continues to grow, and as Islamic fundamentalism and anti-Semitism
rises, it appears as if the number of French Jews buying apartments
in Netanya (and several other areas in Israel) will only increase.
When I was in Israel this past summer, two days before the war's
outbreak, I ran into one of the real estate agents we had dealt
with, Alon Barness. "Do you want to sell your seafront apartment?"
he asked. "No, we just bought it," I replied. He responded,
"I know, but you can flip it and make money." He explained
that from January to July 2006, our apartment's value had increased
by approximately 20 per cent. Our estate agent, Laura Shusterman
from Anglo Saxon Realty, confirmed that figure.
When the war broke out, I anticipated that all real estate values
in Netanya, including that of our apartment, would drop. After all,
although Netanya itself was not hit by Hezbollah rockets, three
Katyushas landed in nearby Hadera, a mere 10-minute drive away.
But when I spoke to Shusterman just days before the cease-fire in
August 2006, she said, "No, your apartment value hasn't dropped.
There are still some French tourists who came to Netanya during
the war and bought apartments, not as many as usual, but enough
to keep the market going."
During Sukkot, in October 2006, many French Jewish tourists travelled
to Israel, and Netanya's real estate market was hot again.
This shows that not even the fear of war in Israel has served to
dampen the appetite of France's Jews to buy what they consider to
be their safe homes in Israel. Although there are Arabs in Israel,
and political turmoil, an increasing number of French Jews want
to feel that they are in a country that is "ours," not
"theirs." As Shusterman confirmed to me in November, "The
market for foreign resident's apartments is stronger than it was
year ago.... The French are still buying here even after the recent
war, because they're afraid of the Muslims in France."
British Jews are also buying condominiums in Netanya. As Barry Shaw,
a British-born Israeli real estate agent, told us last January,
"We have marketed projects such as the Royal Residence and
the Royal Sea very successfully to British Jews.... The name royal
is designed to appeal to them. Some of the British never even came
to Israel to see the condominiums – they just bought them over
the Internet."
While this trend slowed during Israel's war with Hezbollah, by Sukkot,
Shaw indicated that British Jews were back again buying sea-view
condominiums in Netanya, and even more so in neighboring Herzliya.
(Sure enough, reported incidents of anti-Semitism in Britain have
also been increasing in this past year.)
Adam, the manager of Netanya's Ace Hardware, who moved to Israel
from Britain a few years ago, was eager to give me his assessment
of the situation: "If you talk to the French Jews around here,
you'll understand that France is a lost cause. Everyone here knows
that there is no future for Jews in France. It's over. In Britain,
it's not as clear yet, but I'm afraid things are going to go sour
there, too. My cousin who wears a Star of David around his neck
got beaten up twice in the past year on the street, something that
has never happened to him before. When I hear that, I think that
Britain could go the way of France."
Rhonda Spivak is a freelance writer who divides her time
between Winnipeg and Netanya, Israel.
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