Property market in Greece is stuck in a rut

Greek bureaucracy is on a par with Uganda's regarding the procedures required for the sale of a property: Following the government interventions of the last few years, it now takes a total of 10 documents, certificates and so on for anyone to be able to sell one item of real estate in Greece, the same number as in the African country whose recent history has been marked by internal and external conflicts, according to the weekly bulletin of the Hellenic Federation of Enterprises (SEV).

The industrialists' group makes it clear that excessive taxation and red tape have harmed the property market to such an extent as to devalue it considerably and rendering a recovery unfeasible.

There are fears that even an economic rebound would fail to resurrect the market, given the burden that property ownership entails these days. SEV warns that the return of the capital gains tax...