A breakdown of costs when purchasing property in Malta

I recently bought a apartment and my biggest frustration along the way was not know WTF was going on. No one could really spell out to me, before I started, what the exact steps are and what this shit is going to cost me. All I knew was what deposit amount I needed to save for and the monthly repayments I’d be signing up to. So I decided to collect everything I experienced during the process and list it here to help the next poor sod trying to plan for this massive investment.

But the deposit is only a fraction (a big fraction, but still a fraction) of what the process of buying property will cost you. This breakdown is specific to Malta and first time buyers. If you are not a first time buyer you may experience different costs (for example, a different deposit might be required).

Deposit: €27,000

If you are lucky you’ll manage to get a loan for 90% of the property, meaning you only need to down-pay 10%. If you are unlucky (read ‘too foreign’) you’ll need to down-pay anything up to 40% up front. If you’re Maltese, likely it’ll never be more than 10% for a first property that you plan to live in, but this can change if it’s not your first home-loan or if you plan to rent the apartment out.

If you are an EU national, some banks will work with a 10% deposit such as BNF, APS. Unfortunately, despite banking with BOV for almost 10 years and being an EU national they would only offer me 70%, meaning I’d have had to put down a deposit of €81,000. Can you imagine having €81,000 in your bank for a deposit (plus extra money for all the other fees)!

Architect: €304.15

These fees are likely to vary per architect, but hopefully this gives you a rough idea. The initial €106 was for work that was done before I even knew if I’d buy the house or not. The permits and plans they did not get until much later and they ended up not noticing a big issue until that point, which delayed the process by 3 months.

Ideally get your architect to get the permits and plans before you sign the promise of sale. They should get the permits and plans, come to the building and measure it up ensuring it matches those plans. If it doesn’t, you can either decide not to purchase, or the seller can begin fixing the issues right away so this is not a shock later on.

• Architectural services rendered to-date including site inspection, research and correspondence

  • €106

• Copy of Permit and Plans

  • €27.95

• Issuance of LRP and Schedule 8 + Lands Registry Plan

  • €170.20

Bank: €604.58

Again, I am sure these fees will vary per bank and things like insurance will vary per person and per property. Your age, lifestyle, property value and more will all affect the insurance prices. You also do not have to go through the bank for the life or property insurance and can shop around. I just thought it would be easier this way and they are not huge amounts.

• Processing legal fees

  • €100

• Booking fee

  • €100

• Life insurance

  • €281.58

  • annually

  • amount varies depending on lifestyle and property value

• Property insurance

  • €93

  • annually

  • amount varies depending on property value

• Form A registration

  • €30

• Bank’s architect valuation fee

  • €200

Stamp Duty: €6000

This will vary depending on if you are a first time buyer or not. As I was a first time buyer, this is what I will detail.

• First time buyer

  • 5% of property value above €175k (increased from €150k in the most recent budget)

  • 20% of the 5% (so 1%) payable on signing of promise of sale

  • the remainder payable on signing of the final contract

So, normally my total stamp duty due would have been:

• €270,000 (sale price)- €150,000 (non taxable amount at the time of signing) = €120,000 (taxable amount)

• 5% of €120,000 = €6000 (total stamp duty due)

Paid in increments of:

• Due on signing of promise: 20% of €6000 = €2700

• Due on signing of final contract: €3,300

However, one lucky part of the recent pandemic was that any sale under promise during a set period would benefit from a reduced fee of 1.5% making my total stamp duty due €1800. However I had already paid €2700 upon signing the promise of sale, so my notary will file for a €900 refund for me.

Notary fees: €5200

My notary presented me with a detailed breakdown of the fees, which did not really make things clearer as there is a lot on there! But I confirmed with the notary and friends that the notary work usually costs between 1 - 2% of the house price, so always budget for the higher end.

The price depends on how much work they have to do during the promise of sale, and some of the work they do will expire if the final contract isn’t signed within a certain timeframe, so the longer the POS the higher the fees are going to be.

Total cost of buying an apartment in Malta

• Deposit + €12,108.73

So in my case (with the deposit amount and the pandemic tax benefit) = €34,908.74