Cyprus property market in 2026: how much is selling, who is buying and what prices are doing

This is the housing market of the Republic of Cyprus as the official statistics describe it in September 2026: sales contracts from the Department of Lands and Surveys (DLS) for January to August, the Central Bank price index for the second quarter, and building permits from the Statistical Service (Cystat) for January to May. Every number carries its period, and the documents are listed at the end. The north of the island is not in these figures.

We build in Paphos, so Paphos gets its own line in every section.

How much is selling: contracts by district

The quickest read on demand is the number of sales contracts lodged with the DLS. Under Law 81(I)/2011 a contract is deposited within six months of signing, and that secures the buyer's claim on the property, including on a home that is still being built. A transfer is a different measure: it is registered once there is a title deed, so on new builds it comes later — sometimes much later, which is why the contract and the title deed are worth understanding as two separate things.

Contracts lodged, DLS figures as at 1 September 2026:

The 2025 total of 18,114 contracts was 14.7% above 2024 (15,797). Growth has carried on into 2026, and two districts account for two thirds of it: of the 1,599 extra contracts, 634 were in Limassol and 436 in Paphos. Paphos is growing fastest of the five and now takes one contract in five on the island.

Month by month

Paphos was up on the previous year in seven months out of eight; March was the exception (282 contracts against 294). August is the quiet month everywhere: 1,241 contracts against 2,040 in July. September 2026 had not been published at the time of writing.

Transfers of sale for January to August 2026 came to 12,885, up 3.5% on a year earlier (12,448); in Paphos, 2,380 (+4.5%). The amounts declared on them total €3.02bn island-wide and €621m in Paphos. A transfer records ownership that has already been registered, including on deals signed in earlier years, so it does not move in step with contracts.

Who is buying: foreign and local buyers

The DLS publishes a separate table for foreign buyers: how many properties went into contracts signed by EU nationals (Cypriots excluded) and by non-EU nationals. The Central Bank sets those properties against the total number of contracts and treats local buyers as the remainder, and we do the same. One caveat: the DLS counts foreign buyers by property and the total by contract, so what follows is a ratio rather than an exact share of people.

January to August 2026:

Island-wide the ratio keeps edging up: 39.5% for January to August 2025, 40.1% for the whole of 2025 and 41.9% for the first eight months of 2026. For January to April 2026 it reached 42.6%. Properties bought by foreign nationals rose 20.4% on the same months of last year; the local remainder rose 9.3%. Non-EU buyers account for two thirds of foreign demand, though purchases by EU nationals grew faster in 2026: up 23.5% against 18.9%.

Since Brexit, UK citizens are third-country nationals, so British buyers are counted in the non-EU column. That column is as far as the published figures go: the DLS splits foreign buyers into EU and non-EU and nothing else. Figures by nationality have appeared in the press, attributed to an Interior Ministry reply to Parliament, but we could not find the document itself, so we do not repeat them.

Paphos leads on both measures, ratio and volume: 1,871 properties bought by foreign nationals in eight months, against 1,617 in Limassol. For the whole of 2025 the Paphos ratio was 66.2%. The Central Bank's split for Q2 2026 tells the same story: in its table, local buyers account for 34% in Paphos, EU nationals for 25% and non-EU nationals for 41%. In Nicosia, locals account for 84%. Almost all of this year's growth in Paphos is foreign: properties bought by foreign nationals rose 28.5% (EU buyers 42.1%), while the local remainder rose 2.8%. For a British buyer, Paphos is the district where foreign nationals already make up most of the market.

One more distinction. On transfers, the foreign share is far lower: 3,026 of the 14,429 properties transferred by sale from January to August 2026, or 21.0%, and 11.2% for non-EU buyers. Contracts show who is buying now, off-plan included; transfers show who has already had ownership registered. When a headline says foreigners are buying half of Cyprus, it is worth checking which of the two it means.

Prices: the Central Bank index

The Central Bank of Cyprus publishes its Residential Property Price Index once a quarter; the release for Q2 2026 came out on 24 September 2026. It is built from market valuations and smoothed, and the bank itself notes that it may lag slightly at turning points. Change on a year earlier, %:

The bank puts the rise down to demand, mainly from foreign buyers, and to rising construction costs: Cystat's construction materials price index was up 2.4% on a year earlier in Q2 2026. In Paphos, apartments and houses have parted company: apartments up 18.5% in a year, houses up 3.1%, and over the quarter the Paphos house index slipped slightly, from 110.8 to 109.8 points. If a house or bungalow with a garden is what you are after, that line of the table is the one that describes your market; what is available in Paphos now is on the villas and bungalows page.

For scale, here is the long run of the same index (Q1 2010 = 100). Paphos averaged 100.3 in 2010, 75.1 in 2016, 100.8 in 2024 and stood at 119.4 in Q2 2026. The national index only regained its 2010 level in 2025: 101.9 against 99.6.

For anyone borrowing in Cyprus: the weighted average rate on housing loans was 3.23% in June 2026 (3.26% a year earlier), and new housing loans in Q2 came to €403.6m, up 14.2% on a year earlier.

The Central Bank index averages all housing, resale included. What new builds in Paphos cost right now, by area and number of bedrooms, from available units and excluding VAT, is on our Paphos new-build prices page, refreshed from the developers' price lists every hour. What a flat earns if you let it is a separate question, covered in investment property in Cyprus: yields.

Supply: building permits

Building permits are an early signal of future supply: they show how much housing is planned. Cystat's release of 16 September 2026, homes provided for in the permits issued:

In all, 3,650 permits were issued from January to May 2026 (+32.1%), worth €2.1bn (+43.9%). Permits issued over the whole of 2025 provided for 16,171 homes. Three quarters of the homes in this year's permits are flats in apartment blocks.

Three caveats. A permit is a plan, not a finished home. Since 1 July 2024 permits have been issued by new local government bodies through the "Ippodamos" online system, and Cystat notes that a large volume of older applications, submitted on paper before that date, is going through it too. We therefore read comparisons with earlier years with some care. And the monthly release has no breakdown by district, so we give no separate Paphos figure. June 2026 had not been published at the time of writing.

What it means if you are buying in Paphos

We do not forecast prices: the same Central Bank index for Paphos lost a quarter of its value between 2010 and 2016. Here is what the data does show:

• ·Paphos runs on foreign buyers. A ratio of 70.5% is the highest on the island, and local demand barely grew this year. A change to the rules for non-EU buyers touches Paphos more than any other district: they account for 1,159 properties against 2,654 contracts here, 1,156 against 4,354 in Limassol and 223 against 2,789 in Nicosia.
• ·Those rules may change. Buyers from outside the EU and the EEA, British buyers included, need permission to buy property under the Cap. 109 law; the permission is given by the Council of Ministers, with the power delegated to District Officers. Parliament is debating amendments to that law: a consolidated text was sent to the plenary on 16 April 2026, and the amendments were back on the Interior Committee agenda on 3 September. Among other things, they concern limits on the area a foreigner may acquire and bans on forest and farm land and on land near the ceasefire line or critical infrastructure. No law had been passed as at this article's date. How a purchase works under the current rules is covered in buying property in Cyprus as a foreigner.
• ·Apartments and houses are on different paths. In Paphos the index has apartments up 18.5% in a year and houses up 3.1%, while the number of flats in apartment blocks provided for in building permits across the island has almost doubled: 6,667 against 3,497 for January to May.
• ·Catalogue prices exclude VAT. Whether you pay 5% or 19% depends on whether you will live in the home yourself, and on its size and price; see VAT on new-build property in Cyprus, and for everything a purchase costs on top of the price, the cost of buying property in Cyprus.

What to watch between now and the end of the year:

1. 01The monthly DLS contract tables, especially the Paphos line and the foreign-buyer table. The latest file is dated 1 September 2026 and runs to August.
2. 02The Central Bank index for Q3 2026. Last year's Q3 release came out on 9 December 2025.
3. 03Cystat's monthly building permit releases.
4. 04The vote on the Cap. 109 amendments.

We build in Paphos: our own Michelle Park (completion due Q2 2028), Universal Park 1 (completed, with title deeds issued) and vetted developments by other builders in the catalogue. Current prices by area are on the Paphos new-build prices page, the differences between neighbourhoods are in Paphos areas, and every available home is in the catalogue.