Global Real Estate Outlook with Farnaz Fazaipour & Lee Summers

Join Farnaz Fazaipour and Lee Summers, founder of the Summers Global Team, as they explore the latest real estate trends across major international markets. With a network of 18 global agents and 47 satellite agents, this episode covers key insights into:

• New York’s dynamic property market and its appeal to international investors.
• Portugal’s booming interest post-Golden Visa changes and Madrid’s rising appeal.
• The surge in Italian real estate and Milan’s growing popularity.
• Australia’s emerging real estate opportunities and global accessibility.
• Luxury property investments, vineyard acquisitions, and market shifts.

Whether you're an investor, a broker, or just passionate about global real estate, tune in for expert insights, market intelligence, and strategies for property investment worldwide.

📍 Stay informed & connect with top brokers at londonproperty.co.uk and the Summers Global Team.

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Transcript

Speaker 1  0:00  
Lee, Welcome to London property's global real estate Outlook with Farnaz Fazaipour, in association with Lee summers, founder of the summers global team, explore the latest trends in major markets worldwide with a network of 18 global agents and 47 satellite agents.

Farnaz Fazaipour  0:19  
Hello and welcome to London property. This is your host, Farnaz Fazaipour, and we're delighted to welcome Lee summers back to the show, Lee, please give us a little brief introduction for those listeners who haven't heard about what you're doing with regards to your global real estate presence.

Speaker 2  0:36  
Thank you, Farnaz. I run the summers global team, which in essence, are different people, different brokers around the world. And I keep quite a lot of contacts where we have the actual brokers, and then we have what is known as satellite people. So if somebody says, I want Singapore, I want New Delhi. Or if somebody wants something in the Midwest, which is very popular, let's say Aspen. Or let's move on to Europe. If somebody wants England, of course, and Spain and Portugal, we have top people who can take care of them. And there's a lot of places that people would like to buy, let's say, like an area in France like the Dordogne, some people are interested in investing in wineries. We have people, we have a vineyard division, and we have people that can handle top brokers in all these different areas, and they're small areas, and we can handle that too. We do a lot of research with our brokers, and they're all professional, some with top agencies in different parts of the world. So we do connect. We do a connection for everybody. And I'll also, I'm also happy to answer questions for people, and get people good people for handling the money. End of it, the investing side, the laws, the legalities of buying, especially, let's say, once buying in New York, which is a fascinating thing for a lot of people. Buying in New York is extraordinarily easy. Everything's handled by a lawyer and an accountant, and we handle that, and you don't even have to come. It's, you know, it's very easy, and, needless to say, you know, very safe and probably very good money making. Because we also handle, if somebody, let's say, buys for investment in New York, we then handle getting renters for them. So

Farnaz Fazaipour  2:56  
it's like a one stop shop for somebody who, who wants to do something in another country, and they want to make sure that they're, you they're connected with the right people. And what you bring to the to the to the table is really your experience enables you to really start having a relationship with some of these top brokers in different countries, and judge from what you've learned over the decades that you've been in the business, if somebody has got that caliber that you're looking for,

Speaker 2  3:24  
absolutely and and the fact is, is that, because I was with an international firm, I was executive director of Sotheby's for so long that the context that I made throughout the world and people are very Happy, the brokers are very happy when I say because they feel that they want their product to get out there. You know, when somebody has something in a country and you say, we'd like to send American clients or British clients or whatever, you know, we're interested, they get very excited because it opens up a whole new market for them, rather than a local market,

Farnaz Fazaipour  4:00  
yeah, which is increasingly becoming a thing, you know, I think when you and I first started in the industry, you know, if somebody said to you, to you, can you sell this for me in South Africa, we were so we're so, like, busy doing what we're doing, that the concept of trying to help someone in another country was nice, but it was never going to happen. It was

Speaker 2  4:18  
never going to happen. And plus, the fact that I think probably I, because of so many years of doing this, I have this, these names, I have these brokers who I keep in touch. Well,

Farnaz Fazaipour  4:33  
you remember the gems right? When you meet people, you're like, That guy can get this done exactly,

Speaker 2  4:38  
exactly. And that's the everything is due to knowing the right person. Yeah, so if somebody calls you up, like, I get a lot of calls from lawyers and accountants and they say, you know, we have a client, and they're interested in getting a PA to tear, you know, in in Zurich, and, you know, we called you, what would you suggest? Yeah. And.

Farnaz Fazaipour  4:59  
Checkpoint, Charlie,

Speaker 2  5:02  
so, you know, whatever and whoever in in Zurich, and I met him, and he's very nice, and I contact the person who are going to say, you know, I might have a client for you. Tell me, you know, what's new? It's such a small world now than it used to be, that it's almost easy, and now with WhatsApp, you know, you dial the phone and you get them on the phone, and it's like talking to somebody.

Farnaz Fazaipour  5:27  
Your colleagues have become global. So let's have a let's have a quick catch up. And welcome to London. By the way, it's nice to do it in person. Let's have a quick catch up of what's going on in New York. I'll tell you a snapshot of what's going on in London, and then maybe we can just touch on some of the things that have happened since we last spoke, where you've seen some movement in different different jurisdictions. So let's start with New York. What's happening, apart from the fact that you've got a very exciting change going on with with the new president, it's almost like watching a movie every day, which is, which is what I do every day, entertaining. It

Speaker 2  6:00  
is. It's entertaining every day. We do. We open the newspaper. Don't know what to you know, turn on the news.

Farnaz Fazaipour  6:06  
Definitely not dull. But no,

Speaker 2  6:08  
it's not dull. Essentially, in the scheme of things, it seems to be proven quite popular. We'll say time will tell. Time will tell.

Farnaz Fazaipour  6:16  
And has that had an effect on the on the local market? Have you seen more enthusiasm?

Speaker 2  6:21  
So we should know we've got a lot of product on the market in New York City. Now, for some reason, I don't know, there's a lot of buying and selling. It's not if it was just selling, I'd say, wow, what's going on? But it's people buying. So there's a lot of people, there's a lot of turnover. There's a lot of people moving around. You know, moving around has become so easy. In your series, somebody would buy something, and then they would sit for 15 years and they'd keep it, and their children would go off to school, go away, and they say, it's time to sell. Nowadays, people, they keep something a few years. They say, we wonder, let's have something in our husband, let's go, you know, wind down a bit, and we are apartments too big. Let's get something smaller, and then we'll buy a separate apartment in the Caribbean, let's do that. There's a lot of people are less frightened about real estate. They just, like, really open about real estate. Used to say to somebody, you know, buy an apartment in the Bahamas. And they would look at you, you know, like, What do you mean? Now

Farnaz Fazaipour  7:24  
it's easier. It almost feels like COVID gave everybody wings, right? It's like before you were really stuck in your own ways. Now, people seem to have become a lot more creatives, like, life's too short, you know, how do I want to live? Where do I want to go? What do I want to do? And then they're actually actioning it. And, you know,

Speaker 2  7:41  
what's the biggest probably, the help on something like this is probably during COVID. People looked at internet more. You know, before it was business, you were on, you know, your computer constantly. But now people are searching around. It's easy. Oh, look at this place. And you press a button and there's all the information on the place, there's pictures, there's information, there's money, how you can borrow. It's like, it's easy. It's

Farnaz Fazaipour  8:09  
coming up with, you come up with

Speaker 2  8:10  
these things. You know, I always wanted this area, that area, you press a button and there's all the information at your fingertips. Do you think the activity

Farnaz Fazaipour  8:18  
in New York is because prices have kind of become more realistic, so people are buying and selling. Or how did that come about? Why do you think the activity has come

Speaker 2  8:29  
you know, New York is as New York, the the prices in New York, and when I when I travel around and I see the prices and what you get in New York is really incredible, because we Americans, if I dare say this, are very, a little bit spoiled. You know, where's the doorman? You know, where's the you know, I want to have this delivered. I want to have this done. I They want everything done for them. You buy an apartment in New York, everything's done for you. And it's getting more and more. There's the new buildings all have wine rooms, wine tasting rooms. And, I mean, you know, it's a lifestyle. It just takes your breath away. Yeah, it's a lifestyle. And but what stops people a little bit is the price of the apartment is actually a kind of fare for what you're getting is, is your

Farnaz Fazaipour  9:19  
kind of fair $20 million well,

Speaker 2  9:21  
for what you get for dollars, you're getting a lifestyle. Yeah, you're not just getting an apartment. You're getting

Farnaz Fazaipour  9:28  
a life. But what's causing this, this activity that you're noticing, has it been flat for a while, and people just got fed up, and they need to do something? Yeah? Have the prices become more realistic, or there's a new president, and people know what's going on. It's

Speaker 2  9:42  
just, it's just people New York. Just, you know, every time somebody comes up with our own New York, and then all of a sudden they go, everybody wants New York. There's everything there, right? It is so easy to live

Farnaz Fazaipour  9:54  
it's an international destination, isn't it? It's

Speaker 2  9:57  
easy to live in New York. You want anything in New York. Up, you lift a phone, and if they don't come within 24 hours you want, you're finding somebody else. You snooze, you lose in New York. So yeah, well, there really, but your monthly Co Op and condo fees are high, your monthly real estate taxes, so, yeah, paying. Okay, so you're paying for the apartment, but then your monthly fees are high. So a lot of people who are from around the world, their fees the monthly are much, much less, yeah, but, but ours is inclusive of everything being given to you. You are Hello, you call up. I'm coming to New York. I want my fridge stocked. I want this, right? We are used to

Farnaz Fazaipour  10:41  
having so you don't have to have your own personal staff, because they're so heavily serviced these apartment buildings,

Speaker 2  10:47  
and you don't need to have your own stuff, because you say, I'm coming to New York for two weeks. And they, we would, they would have a stop the building, as it happened, there's just this is all available. People are used to this. And everything is delivered. Everything is delivered the food. You know, it's five o'clock and you want this. There's always somebody delivering this food to you from all the top restaurants in New York. I think Americans are very small when it comes to service, and that's why maybe they complain a little bit when they go to different places they're expecting that now this is, this is New York, the rest of the country, the rest of the country, the monthly prices are much less. So your condo Co Op prices are much as New York has a lot of co ops. The rest of the country, it's mostly condos. Yeah, New York is now more and more condos.

Farnaz Fazaipour  11:38  
So the reason I was asking this is because I always find that New York and London have kind of this relationship where, you know similar things to happen. Because what we're expecting in 2025 and in London is that there will be more activity. And the reason that there'll be more activity, we think, is because the market's been flat for about 10 years, first of all, and second of all, a lot of the competition from very wealthy overseas people is kind of on the back burner at the moment with all the changes that we've had with the non DOMs leaving. So we think that the market is potentially going to go back to the locals, and the activity that we're going to see here this year is going to be very much local people getting back on the housing ladder, and it's certainly something that the government want to happen. So our activity here, we're relying on that. So what is going to happen to that mid market? Well, mid market in these million, millions and millions. It's not really mid market, but you know, sort of between five, maybe even a bit more, maybe six, 7 million to 20 million markets. You know, it will wonder that was the people who got targeted tax wise. So what's going to happen in that market? Would be really interesting for us to see this year. But, you know, that's that's the reason I was asking you. Because sometimes, you know, America's that much further ahead, so we can see what could potentially be coming to us. And that's why I kept asking you, what do you think is causing the activity in New York at the moment?

Speaker 2  13:06  
It just, it just is a place you know about the thing about New York, and you know, I travel around the world, you know, I'm really cognizant of what goes on in different areas as far as real estate is concerned. But New York is extraordinarily easy. It's it's the easiest place. It could be

Farnaz Fazaipour  13:25  
just people coming from other countries as well, now that they know back this,

Speaker 2  13:30  
and then everything is just done. Yeah? You don't have to think

Farnaz Fazaipour  13:34  
maybe you're getting the people we're losing, yeah, right, the people we're losing in London. They think, Okay, well, let's just go by New York then, but where the regulations are getting less day by day? Well, yeah, right.

Speaker 2  13:49  
And we have very strong organizations that counter when they start getting crazy. And now president, who is, you know, globally getting he's anti, you know, certain regulations. You know, the world has become so regulated some countries, of course, more than you know, more than others. I think that probably California is going to have a hard time now. You know, California has environmentally environmental problems. It's a big problem.

Farnaz Fazaipour  14:17  
And what do you mean, the fires, earthquakes, etc, they're so

Speaker 2  14:20  
easy to start. There's always something going on in California. And the fires are a major and the insurance problems, you know, the insurance premiums and things like that, which, you know, we don't have, I think, I think that Asia also is not as it was. You know, a huge, big force used to be Hong Kong. Hong Kong was like a center of everything, a meeting place of people all over Asia coming up to meet in Hong Kong. And of course, Hong Kong's uh prices. Real Estate were always huge. I mean, it was just huge. A lot of money to buy in Hong Kong, yeah, very

Farnaz Fazaipour  15:05  
small properties for a lot of money. Yeah, people

Speaker 2  15:07  
buy now Hong Kong, there's a lot of sort of, like underground things where people are not buying and they're just not going into Hong Kong, which some of my Hong Kong friends would be very angry if you know they heard me say that, but that is what's happening.

Farnaz Fazaipour  15:22  
They might hear you say that, if we've got enough followers that include your friends, but no, so it's interesting you're going to different places, because that was going to be my next question. So since the last time we spoke, if you had to give me you know, three things that are happening that are showing something new trend. Where do you see movement globally? You mean an area, just from a real estate perspective, you know, if you would say, Oh, well, you know, interestingly, this is happening in America. That's happening in Europe. This is happening in Asia. What have you noticed from talking to your global network of agents. What's going on?

Speaker 2  16:01  
Well, there is, there's a lot of movement in Portugal. You know, Portugal was sort of like, always on the back burner. You know, it was never, was never, you know, how do I say this Spain, it

Farnaz Fazaipour  16:18  
was a good place to retire and play golf, is what you're saying, yes. And also,

Speaker 2  16:21  
they didn't have much interest in infrastructure, you know, Portugal, because it's not a country that has a huge amount of money, yeah. So what would happen is, so then they had, they brought in that program where you could, you know, the golden visa, just, you know, for 500,000 and you would then, after five years, you would be able to be joined, you know, the EU. And this became very attractive for a lot of people, for a lot of Asian people, to have a chance to become an EU, to be part of the EU after four or five years. This was, you know, so they get the golden visa that they stopped. They might have it in certain areas, and they do have it for commercial. If you buy some commercial, they still have it intact. But there's a huge amount of people who now are interested in Portugal, and they're interested in buying there. The weather is nice. The infrastructure has gotten better. The people are speaking more and more English. That's very important, because English is an international language, and Portugal was a little bit behind. So you would go there and menus would not be the the waiters didn't speak English and and this was hard.

Farnaz Fazaipour  17:38  
They were not used to the international traffic, and now they become more used to international traffic. People potentially have friends who went there because of the Golden visa. So now there's other interests coming, and

Speaker 2  17:47  
there's a lot of interest. The prices have gone up dramatically. Yeah, Portugal used to be where you got the bargain. Yeah. But as the prices have gone up, the big thing in Europe, I think I watch because I love that city is Madrid. Madrid is, is

Farnaz Fazaipour  18:05  
booming, booming. A lot of money from Mexico is going there for private equity. And, you know, I think that you can see that the interest in Madrid, Spain is, in any case, having a golden era. I always said, you know, they're having so much of a golden era that they won the football. They won Wimbledon. You know? And they're all on a high. They're on a high, which is great news for me, because, you know, we've got some interest in Seville, but it's, it is really a country that is having a golden era, isn't it? Well,

Speaker 2  18:34  
you know, but they, they were good at it, because, you know what they've done, it's clean. It's so clean. Everybody comments when they go there, how the streets are clean, everything,

Farnaz Fazaipour  18:43  
and they will have brand new motorways everywhere. It's like

Speaker 2  18:46  
the infrastructure, yeah, we have a, you know, we handle vineyards, and we have a vineyard, and they're building a road down, and they're going to build a rich down. I mean, they're just building away, and they're bringing real railroads in different areas, so people can get around from Madrid and Barcelona, you know, all around, yeah, the food and everybody has started to talk about the food in Spain is really fantastic. The waiters all speak English. It's a lot of restaurants that have opened their own truly international in nature, and people feel very comfortable going there. Now, what's very interesting, and I want to talk about this, is hotels go where money is and which and Richard, every top name is now in Madrid, every top name hotel in the world has opened up

Farnaz Fazaipour  19:44  
a hotel that's a really good tip. That's a really good tip when you start seeing hotels open up,

Speaker 2  19:50  
well, you have a fantastic rosewood and you have a fantastic Mandarin peninsula, and you have what things won after the villa Magna. When you have these hotels, yeah, it means they've they've done that,

Farnaz Fazaipour  20:04  
they've done their homework. They know where they're going. They know anywhere else that you've noticed things in Europe.

Speaker 2  20:08  
What's very interesting is Italy has become, you know, there used to be a little joke because people would think, well, maybe Italy, forgive me, anybody, I don't want to, and somebody really was not as efficient or you could but now the real estate world, you need to buy something. You need to sell something. They've got great brokers. They have the commission stamp packed. One pays one thing, one pays another. There's a definite system Lucky

Farnaz Fazaipour  20:37  
them, because our commissions are the worst in the Western world.

Speaker 2  20:40  
I mean,

Farnaz Fazaipour  20:43  
honestly,

Speaker 2  20:44  
they have to be taken in, but Italy has got it down, and we have a fabulous office in in Milan, yeah, and lot of Americans going to move in Milan, which is kind of interesting. Yeah, very interesting. Well,

Farnaz Fazaipour  20:58  
they because they've introduced this tax that you can pay 200,000 a year and be exempt from worldwide. So that's that's attracted a lot

Speaker 2  21:07  
of wealth. I think it's 4% or something like that. And it's like really easy, because that's all you pay for. You know, if you become,

Farnaz Fazaipour  21:14  
I think it's just a flat fee. But anyway, we're not tax experts. We won't go there. So where else in the world have you? Have you noticed anything? I know that you've got, you've started conversations in India.

Speaker 2  21:24  
Yes, India, you know, it's not like we have people saying we have to move, you know, to Bombay.

Farnaz Fazaipour  21:31  
But there's a lot of interest the other way, right? Indian bias, actions in

Speaker 2  21:37  
you know, I think, I think you know what, you know, what is an area that I am not an expert on, and I would love to be, is Australia. We that gets such fantastic feedback Australia, and for us in the Western world, it's so

Farnaz Fazaipour  21:55  
far, it's too I tell you something, someone told me about it, because I actually went there on my honeymoon as one of the stops that we made. And when I said to a friend of mine, this place is amazing, she said it's too far away for people to go and ruin it. That's a good right. So, so you're noticing people asking about Australia.

Speaker 2  22:11  
People do ask about Australia. It is what's happening, though, is a small thing. We're having a few planes a day that go direct right from Texas. You can go direct from Los Angeles.

Farnaz Fazaipour  22:25  
I don't you think how long that takes when an airplane can

Speaker 2  22:29  
go direct to country? It's like Singapore airways from New York, this two or three place direct into Singapore, right?

Farnaz Fazaipour  22:37  
So that's having an impact 20 hours, but it is. They're a bit like the hotels. They've done their research. They know that the traffic is coming, and once they start having straight lines to that, then you know, something's up. Something

Speaker 2  22:49  
is up, right? And so they're doing so Australia has, it's one of the longest flights in the world. I forget who's flying it, but Australia, every time you hear about Australia, there's always, somebody always says something nice about it. And everybody has their favorite little areas. It's a matter of, it's a matter of

Farnaz Fazaipour  23:06  
going. So if you're top broker and you're listening to Lee, this would be the time to get in touch with Lee about Australia. Australia

Speaker 2  23:12  
is, you know, yeah, I believe it's. But of course, it is the distance. I mean, it is not, it is not for, you know, everybody. I mean, in the end, the closest thing, the closest thing in the end is when you have that UK us connection, the connection, the the flying, the Evie, the eve of coming, you know, it's, it's when I came in for New York, get to the airport, get on the plane, six and a half hours, I land and I'm in like, it's just, like,

Farnaz Fazaipour  23:47  
easy. It's so it's easy, and there's so many flights a day. Well, listen, I'm not going to take up too much of your time, because I know you're here for a short visit. I thank you for talking to us, and we love to get our you know, couple of months apart updates from you of what's going on and for our listeners, it's important to know that if you want to be connected to the top brokers in any destination, check in with us, because we might be able to have that solution that you're looking for. So thank you very much. Lee and I look forward to speaking to you again, either in person or virtually.

Speaker 2  24:20  
Oh, thank you. Farnaz, nice, nice, speaking to you and seeing you again.

Speaker 1  24:23  
Thanks for tuning in to our global real estate outlook. For personalized advice, contact us to connect with the right expert for your property needs. Stay informed and make smart property decisions with londonproperty.co.uk, and the summer's global team. You.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai