After a day spent online advising women in the UK and New Zealand how to kick-start their careers, Helen Morphew will head through fields and vineyards towards the sea with her dog, Asha. Helen and her husband, Rob, live in Puigmolto, a village 25 miles southwest of Barcelona.
“It takes about 35 minutes to reach Terramar, a beach in Sitges, where we’ll grab an Aperol at a chiringuito [beach bar],” says Morphew, 52, who moved from Surrey to Spain, via New Zealand, in 2019, and set up Asha House Coaching. Rob, 49, is a computer programmer.
“Sometimes we’ll pass people foraging for wild asparagus. It’s very rural yet only a ten-minute drive to the buzz of Sitges. We wanted a coastal location with an international feel, close to an airport, which is why we chose south of Barcelona.”
Helen Morphew on Terramar beach in Sitges with her dog, Asha
Famed for its bohemian heritage, carnival and LGBTQ+ scene, Sitges is a lively international beach town on the Costa Dorada (“Gold Coast”). In 1891 the modernist artist and writer Santiago Rusiñol set up his atelier there, and in the 1960s the town was at the heart of Spain’s counterculture.
Less seasonal than the Costa Brava, it attracts expats and remote workers. Almost 35 per cent of the permanent residents are from the UK, the Netherlands, France and Scandinavia, including families who send their children to international schools in the area.
Popular among these is the British School of Barcelona (BSB), with campuses in Sitges and nearby Castelldefels. Rachel Haslam, director of the Sitges branch of the estate agency Lucas Fox, is a former teacher who moved to the city 22 years ago. She says, “Sitges is known as a party place but it draws people who want to live in a working town too — it’s like a Spanish Brighton.”
Locals tend to avoid “Sin Street” — the strip of bars and nightclubs — and head to the upmarket restaurants of the Aiguadolc marina area, the old town or San Sebastian beach.
A four-bedroom villa with a pool in Sitges is on the market for €870,000 with Think Spain
QUIQUE
David Waddington, 64, loves the sociability of Terramar golf club. He moved to Puigmolto two years ago from Clerkenwell in London and works remotely as an accountant. “A lot of people like me are moving here to reinvent themselves — it’s a very inclusive and balanced life,” he says.
Property prices reflect the area’s popularity. With an average price of €4,594 (about £3,900) per sq m — up 7.6 per cent in the year to May, according to the Spanish property website Idealista — you’ll need about €350,000 for a good-sized apartment.
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The prime residential areas in Sitges are Terramar (homes on big plots near the sea) and Can Girona, an exclusive community where houses start at €3.5 million, while Vallpineda is a popular family-friendly community with villas from about €1.5 million. “Olivella, a 20-minute drive to the north of Sitges, is popular with British buyers who have a budget of €500,000-700,000 and are looking for a villa with a pool,” Haslam says.
Year-round events, including February’s carnival, the Fantastic film festival and even a patchwork quilt fest, mean a strong demand for rental properties outside the summer season, says Miriam Burke, the co-founder of Utopia Villas, a local rentals agency.
“Houses are rented during the off-season for one to six months, and smaller family houses close to town tend to rent out more easily,” Burke says. A modern four-bedroom, four-bathroom villa with a private pool rents for a “negotiable” €3,500 a month out of season.
A three-bedroom villa with a pool in Calafell is on the market for €425,000 with Lucas Fox
Buyers should beware that current restrictions mean that if you purchase a property with a holiday rentals licence you do not inherit the licence, Haslam says.
Other popular coastal towns near Sitges include Vilanova i la Geltru and Calafell, both to the west, where villas can be found for less than €500,000 near pristine beaches, the limestone hills of Garraf Park and vineyards — the region’s renowned Priorat wines can be bought by the glass from the barrel.
George Baillie and his wife, Lisa, own a home near Tarragona and love the region’s lifestyle
It’s the proximity to ski resorts, historic cities and good golf courses that drew George Baillie, an avid golfer, and his wife, Lisa, to the region. The couple bought a new four-bedroom villa last year at Infinitum, a golf resort built on wetland near Tarragona.
“The lifestyle is so good, I can play golf all year and it’s not as crazy-busy as Sitges in summer,” says Baillie, 55, a long-haul pilot who splits his time between Catalonia and Lincoln. “Tarragona is a lovely, underrated city and I can get to Barcelona airport from there in about an hour.”
While Infinitum’s three golf courses and beach club opened in 2009, the building of 2,300 new homes was delayed by the Spanish property crash at that time, according to Esther Diaz Fernandez, a real estate director at the resort. New two-bedroom properties there cost from €450,000 and four-bedroom villas from €748,000. “Our buyers like the natural tranquillity and nearby beaches,” she says.
A four-bedroom new-build villa with a pool in the Infinitum golf resort in Tarragona, is for sale at €897,000 with Infinitum Living
In the Ebro Delta, 80 miles to the west of Sitges, you can watch flamingos nesting or taste freshly caught oysters, says Peter Lambert, 63, from Liverpool. Lambert and his wife, Karen, have been renovating a four-bedroom house in Amposta. “Mild winters and not-too-hot summers mean the region is verdant, with beautiful forests, mountains and beaches with palm trees,” he says.
Properties in Ebro are much more affordable than in Sitges, with an average of €2,027 per sq m for the province of Tarragona, according to Idealista, meaning an apartment can easily be found for €100,000. Fewer buyers are international than in Sitges, says Raül Anguera of Lucas Fox Tarragona. High-end pockets include Cala Tamarit, where seafront villas start at about €1.7 million, with much lower prices in Cambrils, a pretty beach town a few minutes along the coast.
Need to know
• Antoni Gaudí, the great Catalan architect and designer, was born in Reus in the Tarragona province.
• Remote workers wishing to spend more than 90 days in Spain can apply for the digital nomad visa and also a reduced tax regime.
• Property purchase tax (ITP) in Catalonia is 10 per cent of the property price.