A version of the same pushback comes up almost every week with buyers I work with in Lagos: “We’re waiting for prices to drop now the Golden Visa is gone.” It is a reasonable thing to think. The Golden Visa property route closed in 2023, and non-resident property transactions across Portugal fell sharply in the years after. So where is the correction?
New data from INE, Portugal’s national statistics institute, published this week, answers that question with numbers instead of a hunch: Algarve property valuations hit 3,010 euros per square metre in July 2026, up 16.5% for apartments compared to a year earlier. There is no correction showing up in the numbers. If anything, the climb has picked up pace.
Are Algarve property prices still rising in 2026, or has the market started to correct?
They are still rising, and by a wide margin. INE’s July 2026 figures put the national median property valuation at 2,240 euros per square metre, with apartments nationally at 2,627 euros per square metre. The Algarve sits well above both: 3,010 euros per square metre, which is 32.6% above the national median. Only Greater Lisbon runs higher, at 3,469 euros per square metre. Nationally, valuations rose 15.2% year on year, houses were up 13.6%, and apartments led the way at 16.5%. Month on month, the market added another 0.5% between June and July alone.
One detail matters more than the headline number for anyone actually buying: this is bank valuation data, not asking prices. INE builds it from more than 34,000 real valuations carried out by banks against live mortgage applications. It is what a lender’s own surveyor thinks a property is worth today, not what an agent has listed it for. That distinction is the whole reason this data is worth reading closely if you are financing a purchase, because it is the number your bank will actually lend against.
Why Lagos hasn’t followed the Golden Visa exit
The logic behind “prices should be dropping” usually rests on the idea that Golden Visa buyers were propping up Algarve prices, and that pulling that programme should have let the air out. It is a fair theory. It just does not match who was buying in Lagos in the first place. The Golden Visa cohort, historically Chinese, American and Brazilian investors, clustered overwhelmingly in Lisbon, Cascais and Porto. Lagos has always run on a different buyer: British, Dutch and German lifestyle purchasers moving here to actually live, not to bank a residency permit. That is a different motivation entirely, and it was largely untouched by what changed in 2023.
The INE numbers this week are the clearest confirmation yet that this was never a Golden Visa town, at least not in the way the headlines assumed. If you are holding off on Lagos specifically because you are waiting for a Golden Visa correction, you are betting on a mechanism that never really applied here.
| Area | Valuation, July 2026 | YoY change | vs national median |
|---|---|---|---|
| National median | €2,240/m² | +15.2% | — |
| National apartments | €2,627/m² | +16.5% | +17.3% |
| Algarve | €3,010/m² | tracking the national trend | +32.6% |
| Greater Lisbon | €3,469/m² | tracking the national trend | +54.9% |
Source: INE (Instituto Nacional de Estatistica), bank valuation data from mortgage applications, July 2026.
What a rising bank valuation actually changes if you are financing
Non-resident buyers in Portugal are typically looking at 60 to 70% loan-to-value from an EU lender, or closer to 60 to 65% for UK and US buyers, and the loan is sized against the bank’s own valuation, not your agreed purchase price. When valuations are climbing this fast, two things tend to happen at once, and buyers are rarely warned about either.
First, a rising valuation trend generally works in your favour: banks are less likely to value a well-priced property below the agreed sale price, which was a real risk two or three years ago when the market moved faster than lenders’ own data. Second, and this is the part worth budgeting for, if you agree a price above the bank’s valuation, which still happens on properties with strong emotional appeal or a rare view, the gap comes out of your own cash, on top of your deposit. On a 750,000 euro purchase in Lagos at 65% LTV, that is already 262,500 euros of your own money before you count IMT, stamp duty and legal fees. A valuation shortfall of even 5% adds another 37,500 euros you need to find in cash. Get a written valuation estimate from your lender before you go to contract, not after.
I am seeing this play out with clients right now. Nobody is pulling back because the numbers are rising. They are asking sharper questions about financing timelines instead, because a valuation that is out of date by even a few months can misjudge the deposit they actually need.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are Algarve property prices still rising in 2026, or has the market started to correct?
They are still rising. INE’s July 2026 data puts Algarve bank valuations at 3,010 euros per square metre, up 16.5% year on year for apartments nationally, with no sign of a slowdown in the monthly figures.
What is a bank valuation and how is it different from the asking price?
A bank valuation is what a lender’s surveyor assesses a property to be worth when you apply for a mortgage. It is used to calculate how much the bank will lend, and it can run above or below the agreed sale price. Asking prices and agent indices measure something different: what sellers are listing for.
Why hasn’t the end of the Golden Visa cooled prices in Lagos?
Golden Visa buyers were concentrated in Lisbon, Cascais and Porto, not Lagos. Lagos has always run on British, Dutch and German lifestyle buyers moving here to live, a different cohort that was largely unaffected when the property-linked Golden Visa route closed in 2023.
Does a rising bank valuation make it harder or easier to get a mortgage in the Algarve?
Generally easier, since lenders are less likely to value a fairly priced property below the agreed sale price. The risk shifts to properties bought above market value, where the gap between valuation and price has to be covered in cash on top of your deposit.
Is now a bad time to buy in the Algarve because prices keep rising?
Not necessarily. Waiting for a correction that isn’t showing up in the data has a real cost too, since every quarter of delay has meant paying more, not less, for the last several years. The better question is whether your budget and financing are matched to today’s numbers, not last year’s.
Ready to start your Algarve property search? Tell me what you are looking for and I will help you budget against today’s numbers, not last year’s.
