ARCHIVED - 165 new homes to be built in the Isla del Fraile resort just outside Águilas

Confidence grows in the residential tourism sector in south-west Murcia

While residential and tourist accommodation construction looks set to grind to a halt in the area of the Mar Menor, where the regional government of Murcia has included a 5-year moratorium on all new construction in its draft law to protect the lagoon, in the south-west of the Costa Cálida there is optimism regarding the future of the sector and in Águilas, close to the boundary of Murcia with Andalucía, another new project is to go ahead on the coast opposite the Isla del Fraile.

Quadratia Investment Partners (QIP), a company formed by the British investment fund M&G and the Alicante-based promoter Quadratia, will begin construction this year of 165 homes on a plot of 18,000 square metres in a project which is budgeted to require an investment of 33 million euros. According to a company press release, the decision to go ahead with this project is based on the “potential of this area in terms of international residential tourism”, and promotion of the development has already begun in Belgium, France and Switzerland at international tourism fairs.

The new Isea Calma development will be located in a part of the Águilas coastline where construction stopped when the economic crisis hit hard at the end of the first decade of this century. By that stage, though, 600 homes had already been built in what is without a doubt one of the most spectacular coastal locations in the Region of Murcia, and in consequence the main infrastructures and basic services are already in place.

Equipped with the services of a private security form, a restaurant and social club, a hostel and sports facilities, and close to large shopping and leisure facilities, the Isla del Fraile resort also provides easy access to the beautiful beach of Playa Amarilla directly opposite the island after which it is named.

The first phase of the new development will consist of 85 homes and construction work is set to start in the second half of 2020, the intention being for keys to be handed over to the first owners in late 2022.

Prices range from 143,000 euros for those with mountain views to 240,000 euros for those facing the sea, with the design having been drawn up by the Murcia architect Pablo Chamizo. Sr Chamizo has respected the natural lie of the land and the environment by placing the homes in a spiral around the hill on which the properties will stand, and as a result very few of them are exactly the same.

The return of confidence to the property sector in Águilas was clearly illustrated last year when the TM group announced a project to build 2,313 tourist accommodation properties near the Playa de la Cola, a beach near Calabardina which has recently benefitted from a recovery and regeneration program designed to halt the loss of sand which had reduced its size over the last few years.

Image: QIP

For more local news, events and other information go to the home page of Águilas Today.