Behind the Sales, Episode 4 — Alby, The Agency Mallorca
When Alby, founder of The Agency’s Mallorca franchise, started noticing American accents in the restaurants and coves of the Southwest, he did not wait to see where the trend was heading. He acted. On a Thursday evening, he sent a cold email to Mauricio Umansky, founder of The Agency in Beverly Hills. By the time he reached the front door of his office, Umansky had already replied.
That instinct has since been validated. The Agency now operates five European franchises, and in Mallorca the numbers confirm what Alby saw coming early: Americans are arriving year on year, buying more real estate here. The direct United Airlines flight from New York was a turning point. Flights from LA and Miami are expected to follow. Mallorca is no longer a word Americans have to look up.
A Market Unlike Anything They Know at Home
American buyers arrive with expectations shaped by one of the most structured real estate systems in the world — licensed agents, standardised MLS data, transparent transaction records. What they find in Spain can come as a genuine shock.
“I just thought there’s a gap” in this market for a US brand.
— Alby, The Agency Mallorca
One of the biggest surprises is the absence of clear pricing data. In the US, an agent can pull up what every comparable property on a given street has sold for. Here, that information does not exist in any public register. Prices are not disclosed, square metres are inconsistent, and two neighbouring properties can differ in value by tens of millions — with no public benchmark to explain why.
“Here, it’s all word of mouth and hearsay.”
— Alby, The Agency Mallorca
In Spain, real estate agents are not licensed. A property can be listed with ten different agencies simultaneously, each advertising different square metres, different photographs, different prices.
“You lose control of everything.”
— Alby, The Agency Mallorca
In one case discussed during the episode, American clients came to Marbella, researched the market online, and simply walked away — “Forget about this” — and flew home without buying, because they did not trust what they were seeing.
For agents and lawyers committed to professionalism, this is not just frustrating — it is a market problem that costs everyone. Franke & de la Fuente regularly encounters buyers who were not informed of material legal and tax obligations before completing a purchase. A client who bought a property in Marbella for over €10 million was never told they would be liable for Spain’s solidarity wealth tax. That kind of omission is entirely preventable with the right advisors in place from the start.
The Shift from Holiday Home to Primary Residence
One of the defining changes Alby has witnessed across his 13 years in Mallorcan real estate is the shift in buyer intent. What was once a market dominated by second homes has become something fundamentally different. Post-COVID, buyers are relocating — moving families, enrolling children in local schools, setting up remote offices, and building lives here.
This is the context in which American buyers are arriving. They come knowing they love the island, but not yet knowing it.
“We have a big exploration phase.” We have to “take them by the hand” a little bit and guide them through that journey.
— Alby, The Agency Mallorca
They may arrive expecting to be on the front line of the sea — not realising that much of Mallorca’s coastline is cliff-edged and offers little land. Once they grasp the scale of the island, however, areas they had never considered become possibilities. A drive that would feel short anywhere in the US suddenly opens up the entire island.
What Professional Representation Actually Means Here
In a market without standardised regulation, professional representation is not a formality — it is the entire framework within which a safe transaction happens.
The Agency’s approach in Mallorca is built around exclusivity and focused marketing. Rather than listing a property everywhere and waiting for a buyer to appear, they target marketing directly at the relevant demographic.
“We are taking on fewer listings.” We invest in marketing in each listing we bring on.
— Alby, The Agency Mallorca
For sellers, the benefit is control: one agent, one set of images, one price, one message. For buyers, it means the properties they encounter have been genuinely prepared. This stands in sharp contrast to what Americans are used to at home — a system where “it’s all data they can track” — and it underlines why expert local knowledge is indispensable.
This is equally true on the legal and tax side. Arriving informed — knowing what the solidarity tax is, understanding how inheritance works in Spain, having the NIE in place before making an offer — is the difference between a smooth process and an expensive surprise. International clients who invest significant sums in this market deserve to “feel confident and secure” when they enter it.
The Trajectory
The fundamentals are in place. Direct international flights are multiplying. The “surprises for them is the clarity” — or lack thereof — of the Spanish market will continue to make expert guidance essential. Global hospitality brands — “Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental” — are establishing themselves on the island. Americans are “coming more and more and buying” more real estate here each year.
The buyers who move here earliest, supported by the right professionals, will be the ones who benefit most from what is still — by global standards — a market in the early stages of its international maturity.
Franke & de la Fuente is an international law firm specialising in real estate transactions, tax, and relocation for private clients in Mallorca, Marbella, the Canary Islands, and beyond.
