If you are about to buy an overseas property then, despite today’s uncertain global economy, you are one of a growing number of people returning to the market after a period of, how shall we say, choppy waters.

The latest PrimeLocation.com International Search Index, which is published quarterly, reveals that the number of people house hunting on our site increased overall by 14% during the third quarter of 2011 and by 17% for the top ten most popular destinations (see list below).

At the top of the table, the United States is the most popular attracting 31% more searches than in the previous three months and overall it remains the third most popular destination for property hunters.

France: one of the European countries that an increasing number of British buyers searched for last quarter.

Switzerland was another big winner within the top ten – the number of searches for its Alpine homes increased by 30%, helped by the thousands of wealthy Brits moving money into its safe haven property markets at the moment.

But what, you may ask, is stirring people to buy overseas when several of the countries popular with British buyers are facing financial meltdown – i.e. Spain, Italy, Greece and Portugal?

The answer is that searches are beginning to increase again in the better known destinations despite the financial problems besetting them as many British retirees decide it’s time to emigrate to Europe and beyond for a better quality of life despite the recession.

PrimeLocation.com index also recorded more interest in Germany; searches there rose by 28% compared to the previous quarter driven by its status as the darling of international investor set as its economy shrugs off the recession.

So are there any losers? Only two countries within the top ten saw a decline. Searches for Cyprus property fell by one per cent, and the United Arab Emirates by five per cent, which dropped one place as a result within the Top Ten.

For a full list of the most popular countries by volume of searchs, go to www.primelocation.com.

Find an airport overseas and invariably, as long as the flights are affordable from the UK, you will find holiday homes nearby. This works both ways. Property abroad can rise in value when routes start up, but equally Brits can be left high and dry when they close. So which way will the new routes announced this week go?

The most recent example is Albania, the poorest nation in south eastern Europe and arguably the least secure. Its ‘emerging’ economy hasn’t put off developers building luxury resorts there and with prices starting at €39,000 some investors are piling in. One reason why they’re happy to take the risk and buy property in Albania is thanks to the world’s favourite airline – British Airways this week increased the number of flights between London and Tirana – Albania’s capital – from three times a week to a daily service.

Overall, Albania’s economic indicators are travelling in the right direction. Tourism is increasing for those happy to venture into a country still in the grips of post-Communist architecture – there’s been an 8.5 per cent increase so far this year – and it’s set to join the EU in 2014.

Ravin Maharajah, from Lalzit Bay Resort and Spa – a five-star residential development 45 minutes by car from Tirana, thinks the country’s success is going to continue:

“Interest from international second home buyers is steadily increasing as people realise the buying opportunity is now rather than later when the prices may have gone up.”

At the other end of the property scale, the Alps is another destination to which the number of flights is increasing. It’s one of the most expensive places in the world to buy homes and now budget operator Jet2 is bringing in the Scots – the new services are from Glasgow (to Geneva) and Edinburgh (to Salzburg/Chambery) from December this year.

This is good for those with ski chalets in the Alps as it will increase demand for property at a time when it’s been falling away during the recession. Charlie Williams, from ski property developer Terresens, says: “Giving home owners and holiday makers more choice and more availability to fly is always very positive news. We are particularly interested in the new flights being opened to Chambery.

“This airport is a very key portal to get into the Alps but particularly good for people wanting to ski in the Tarentaise as the airport is only just over an hour from most resorts in this area.  This ski region includes Val d’Isere and Tignes which is undoubtedly one of the largest ski areas in the world.”

PrimeLocation had been pondering this pub-quiz question ever since an invite arrived in our inbox last week, beckoning the team to join a select gathering at the Westbury Hotel in Mayfair. 

The RSVP invite mentioned cocktails and canapes and encouraged us to join upmarket Portuguese and Swiss property experts from agent Sotheby’s Realty International. A more unlikely mob is hard to imagine – clipped, tight lipped Swiss suits mixing with louche, heavily tanned ex beach bums.

The reality was very different. An eclectic mix of PRs, accountants and estate agents from London, Europe and even Miami gathered in a small back room of this posh hotel; there were some distinct accents and the odd good sun tan as well as a buzz from the excitement of being in London for the night.

Over Moet & Chandon bubbles and smoked salmon blinis everyone chatted and predictably shared the same view – it’s a must to own a property abroad. And if you can’t choose between the skiing in Switzerland or the sunbathing in Portugal, why not have a property for each season?

So what do one of Europe’s richest countries and one that’s nearly bankrupt have in common and why are we having a party for them? Apart from the obvious sales push from the agents about the luxury resorts and apartments for sale, it was a celebration of their favourable tax regimes; something of a hot topic for London’s big earners at the moment, as the UK’s higher taxes and regulation bear down on them.

John Duggan from PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Portugal office stands up at the end of a small, informal presentation and cliams that it’s not only Switzerland that has all the tax trump cards.

Despite Portugal’s catastrophic government finances at the moment, we are told it’s a great place for foreign buyers to invest – relocating residents enjoy a  10-year tax holiday plus exemption from tax on foreign pensions and exemptions on investment and rental income. At the mention of in-depth tax and finance we began to glaze over but Mr Duggan has promised to write us a guide explaining in more detail how to invest in Portuguese property, so watch this space.

A villa with private pool at the luxury Pine Cliffs Resort in Portugal

As well as the tax benefits, a tanned Artur Simes showed us his model village of his luxury Algarve resort, Pine Cliffs. Having washed down buckets of champagne and too many prawn skewers, we were somewhat impressed and fancied buying one. Simes is walking proof of the 300 days of sunshine the area gets and he claimed a guaranteed five percent return on investment for three years if you want to let out our property through them.

So what about Switzerland? Many a banker knows the benefits of relocating there. It has one of the lowest taxation rates of any western nation and its taxes are based on your expenditure and standard of living rather than income or assets. And if you’re looking for a property to suit the well-off lifestyle, Du Parc - an imposing Belle Epoque mansion, converted from a hotel to luxury apartments, on the shore of Lake Geneva is a great place to start.

Du Parc Kempinski Residences in Switzerland

But the time had come to go home. The last of the Moet bottles had been upended and the warm Spring evening’s air beckoned. Thanks to Sotheby’s International Realty for the hospitaltiy hospitality.

While everyone is talking ad infinitum about the wedding of William and Kate this month, many have forgotten Will’s horse-mad cousin, Zara Phillips, and her July nuptials.

Zara doesn’t seem to mind as she has lots to be excited about besides her lower-key wedding. There’s the 2012 Olympics in London to prepare for (she’s in the Olympic equestrian team) and a newly built villa on the CampoReal Golf Resort and Spa to move in to.

Back in 2009 Phillips bought the land within the 200-acre gated site and began building her villa, largely because she was drawn to CampoReal’s extraordinary equestrian centre (for her) and its 18-hole golf course (for him).

Royal splash: One of the villas at the Campo Real equestrian resort.

The location is ideal for their busy lifestyles because it’s only 30 minutes from Lisbon airport, from which it’s easy to hop back to Bristol, the nearest airport to the couple’s Cotswolds home. The four-bedroom Portuguese villa (with 220sqm of living space) comes with a private swimming pool and was built on the edge of the old vineyards. It will be the Zara’s first home abroad.

The CampoReal Golf Resort and Spa, which opened in 2006 near Turcifal, offers 372 properties with access to the 18hole golf course. This includes villas, town houses, apartments and a five-star hotel. Buyers can sign a freehold leaseback which means they can stay for six weeks of the year and earn rental income from when they’re not there.

Prices range from €250,000 (£219,015) for a one bedroom apartment, €440,000 (£385,500) for the three-bedroom and three bathroom townhouses and €690,000 (£604,600)for the basic premium villa, but there are extra costs and services that can also be added on. Owners and guests will have access to; on-site restaurants, a car and driver, baby sitting, 24 hour room services, swimming pools, laundry services.

Back to school: villa owners at CampoReal can exercise their horses at the resort's huge outdoor arena.

Phillips and Tindall have had to postpone their honeymoon this July because Tindall will be training and playing in the World Cup warm-up game against Wales on August 6th. As the house should be ready before the wedding they are hoping to get away for a pre-wedding honeymoon before July.

The site – founded by Eduardo Netto de Almeida, part of a dynasty of Portuguese horsemen – is not the first equestrian centre to open in Portugal. In 2007 world ranked show jumper and Irish television personality Jessica Kuerten opened an equestrian centre in Quintas de Obidos after noticing the number of top international show jumpers taking their horses to the silver coast of months at a time. The luxurious and exclusive country club and spa has 79 large lakeside homes, with the equestrian centre at the heart of it.

This Friday the Channel 4 TV show A Place in the Sun begins its three day tenancy at Earls Court in London and Primelocation International will be there, along with 160 companies offering overseas properties for sale and homebuying services.

Headlining the event will the show’s three most famous presenters – Amanda Lamb (who presents the show’s video, below), Jonnie Irwin and Jasmine Harman – who will be appearing on stage to give advice about buying foreign property and answer questions about their work as TV presenters and signing copies of A Place in the Sun magazine. But they will also be joined by other experts including LBC radio presenter, property investment guru and Apprentice TV show contestant James Maxx.

VIDEO: Watch Amanda Lamb introduce this year’s A Place in Sun Live show

Primelocation International’s property analyst Nigel Lewis will also speaking every day at the show on the main stage, revealing ‘ten things you didn’t know about overseas property’ including which country has the easiest buying/conveyancing process; which town the Spanish holiday home revolution started in, which country offers the best quality of life and which day was the best financially to buy a property in Europe over the past year. Catch him during the show at 11.45am on Friday, 12.30pm on Saturday and 2pm on Sunday.

And if you want a free ticket to attend the show – follow this link to claim yours.

Formula One legend Ayrton Senna died at the wheel of his racing car, but remains an idol to millions worldwide. His star is set to rise again when he becomes the subject of a documentary film to be released in UK cinemas in June.

Ahead of that release, Primelocation International can bring you news that the Portuguese villa owned by the double world champion in the three years before his accident on May 1 1994 is now on the market and could be yours – providing you have a Grand Prix-style income to pay the 10m euro price tag.

Senna designed the home as his European base for the eight months of the typical F1 season and would  return to his native Brazil each winter; for that reason it is larger than the typical Algarve holiday home.

The villa sits on the exclusive Quinta do Lago resort and boasts six bedrooms and seven bathrooms, a games den, home cinema and study, plus what the selling agent calls ‘a cosy winter snug’ – that’s a sunken lounge with a fireplace. There is also a three bedroom guest annexe where Senna entertained, amongst others, fellow-Brazilian Rubens Barrichello, now a F1 veteran in his own right and another Algarve resident.

The grounds of Senna’s villa are large – the whole plot is 113,000 square feet – and reflects the driver’s reputation as a fitness devotee. There is a large pool, floodlit tennis court and football pitch as well as a four-hole putting green, trampoline and woodland.

Andre Jordan, the Brazilian who designed the resort back in 1970, says Senna was “exactly the sort of person Quinta do Lago was created for” – well-known, wealthy “but wanting to completely relax in an informal yet exclusive environment.”

The villa is located on Avenida Ayrton Senna – renamed in his honour in 1995 – a sign that whatever happens to the home in the future, the memory of its original owner will live on.

The property is on the market through Savills International

When primelocation wants Hollywood bling that bucks the trend, we look no further than “The Fortress” – the name movie veteran Anjelica Huston has given her LA home now on sale.

At first sight the building, completed in 1994 by sculptor Robert Graham - Huston’s husband until his death in 2008 – looks like a warehouse. But it sits four-square in Venice Beach, one of the plushest parts of Los Angeles and close to the estates owned by other Hollywood glitterati like Kate Beckinsale, Alec Baldwin and Francis Ford Coppola. 

Huston, perhaps best known for her role in The Addams Family franchise and The Witches in the 1990s – as well as being a long-time girlfriend of Jack Nicholson - says she and Robert Graham were inspired by the privacy of the Californian convent in which they spent their honeymoon in 1992.

So they created The Fortress, a functional Bauhaus design complete with girders and struts, steeply walled on its boundaries to keep out prying eyes. But step inside and you see a huge tropical garden, a swimming pool and a garden jacuzzi as part of almost 10,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor studio and gallery space.

There are also almost 4,000 square feet of interior living quarters including a library, dramatic galleries looking over three-storey studio and dance-floor areas, three bedrooms and five bathrooms. There’s also a basement games room and gym for that compulsory LA daily workout.

The property went on sale last year and was first advertised only in California but now, with even Hollywood stars hit by a declining US property market, it is being marketed in Europe by estate agency Engel & Volkers.

The publicity in Europe concentrates on the Mediterranean and French design influences and the Venice Beach boho chic reputation of the house – magazine Vanity Fair says it is found most easily by heading for the tattoo parlours and marijuana shops across the street.

But despite the continuing US downturn and change in global marketing strategy for the house, the asking price remains unchanged at a cool $18m. The owner is clearly not the only stellar characteristic of this particular LA home…

The property market on Spain’s Costas has, if you want to be charitable, been in freefall for nearly three years now but there are promising signs that the unbearable pain in Spain may soon be over – sort of.

Spanish-English developer Taylor Wimpey de España tells me this week that the Brits are back – at last – and the sighs of relief at the company’s Malaga, Alicante and Mallorca offices are palpable.

But the company says it’s only prime properties that are attracting British buyers and usually only in upmarket locations in Majorca and the Costa del Sol. As is always true in recessions, recovery always takes place first in the safest and most familiar markets.

We may have put our dreams of a Spanish home to one side during the recession but Taylor Wimpey España tells me this summer has seen an 80% yearly increase in enquiries from Brits desperate for the Spanish lifestyle including the sunshine, golf courses and Mediterranean beaches. And it’s no longer just the retirees heading to the sun, so far this year 80% of Taylor Wimpey buyers were aged between 30 and 55 years old.

I talked to Victor Sage at Taylor Wimpey, who told me: “Buyers have been waiting for the market to bottom out before they invest. In premier destinations, like Marbella, this is without doubt now the case hence the spike in interest and serious buyers”.

Victor explained that there is oversupply in certain areas of Spain but it is a localised problem and changes from town to town; “the best units in the best resorts will always sell” he assures me.

Prices are 20-25% lower than 2007 but Victor said that if the current demand continues it will push up prices, he thinks that “for those who have been sitting on the fence, sensibly watching the market, now is an excellent time to buy to make the most of the reduced prices and excellent property on offer”.

With less disposable income our property budgets have reduced since 2007 when 45% of us were spending between €250,000 and €350,000 on our Spanish homes. Now 72% of us are on a lower budget of between €150,000 and €250,000 with 60% looking for two bed room properties.

For more information on Taylor Wimpey’s Spanish developments for sale visit their website

Primelocation is sponsoring this year’s  International Property Awards in association with Bloomberg Television, the housing world’s answer to the Oscars with a red carpet event to be held on November 25th and 26th this year in central London. 

So could your next home end up with an international gong for its architecture, build quality or a range of other categories?

These awards may not offer the same glamour and stars as the yearly Oscars in Hollywood, but in many ways they are not far off with categories that include best golf development, international property, apartment and interior design.

The event began it began in 1994 and has developed into a global concern with regional heats held across the world during the build up to the final in London. This comes to a glamorous climax at an event attended by the leading lights of the property world and celebrities.

These in past years have included Rick Wakeman of 1970s supergroup Yes, BBC Royal Correspondent Jenny Bond, interiors expert Linda Barker and Location, Location, Location star Phil Spencer. And the awards have high profile sponsors too. As well as Primelocation.com these include newspaper The New York Times, Google, Bloomberg Television and Maserati.

But one thing that doesn’t change is the robust judging process. Every year the world’s industry experts gather to judge - including this time round Primelocation.com’s Nigel Lewis - whether the hundreds of entries from across the globe pass the quality test.

A wide range of residential and commercial properties are judged from grand villas in Dubai to office developments in Budapest, and previous winners have included UK agent Knight Frank, developer Berkeley Homes (for its Sugar House development in London) and the Dunas Douradas Beach Club on Portugal’s Algarve coast. But winners come from a wide range of countries including Panama, Brazil, India, Singapore, South Africa and Cape Verde.

Many British owners of overseas holiday homes have spent the past 18 months watching their properties endure price drops, no doubt much to their discomfort.

Or at least that is the received wisdom. But research released today reveals that,  instead, the weakening pound has increased rather than diminished the value of their overseas investments.

Figures from foreign exchange specialist Close Treasury show that, despite falling prices in France, Spain, Portugal and the USA, and weak price growth in Italy, the dominance of the euro and dollar have – on paper – helped increase the  value of British-owned properties overseas.

A British-owned villa in Portugal which, despite local price drops, may still be worth more today than 18 months ago following recent pound/euro fluctuations

Close Treasury says the collective value of our places in the sun increased by £2.6 billion between July 2008 and December last year – during the lows of the general economic and banking crisis.

For example, during this period prices in France dropped on average by 6.6% but because of the euro’s increased strength against the pound, British owners saw an average rise in value of £10,400 per property. Close Treasury says there are 98,000 properties in France owned by Brits.

In Spain, where some 144,500 properties are owned by British citizens, house prices fell by 8.35% between 2008 and 2009, but the euro difference gave owners a collective gain of £1.1 billion or £7,700 a property.

And even in the US, where the property market has endured the darkest days most Americans can remember, Brits saw the cash-in value of their properties in the land of the free jump by £1,750.