A top-quality home, which had fetched no more than 150 000 EUR in 2005, practically doubled in price to 300 000 EUR for just one year.

A major impetus to rising the property prices was the EU accession of Bulgaria at the beginning of 2007, when demand briefly outstripped supply.

In 2006 alone, property prices rose by an average of 15% after the registered 40% jump the year before. The Bulgarian residential property prices had tripled over the last five years.

The same trend has continued in 2007. Some Bulgarian cities posted a 25% increase in property prices in Q1 2007. The market value of old homes remained steady while upmarket properties gained 10% year-on-year in Q1 2007.

An average home in Sofia sold for 78 000 EUR in 2006, against a nationwide average of 44 000%. The higher cost of capital cities properties is also seen in other countries.

In Austria, for example, the nationwide average is 165 000 EUR and the price of housing in the capital, Vienna, is 242 000 EUR. The respective figures for the Czech Republic are 67 000 EUR for nationwide average and 112 000 euro in Prague.

However, to get a realistic picture of the Bulgarian property market, data, provided by Era, should be seen in the perspective of the country's poor annual salaries.

Although the country has some of the lowest prices on the continent - with an average property unit offered at only 54 570 EUR - low average earnings render properties expensive for Bulgarians.

Nevertheless, revenues, generated by sales of Bulgarian residential units to foreign nationals, tripled year-on-year to 1.1 billion EUR in 2006, Era data showed. The real estate company expects that this trend will persist.

source: Property Wise Bulgaria