In the central Athens neighborhood of Exarchia, long celebrated for its radical left-wing politics and student uprisings, a quiet transformation is underway. Flat by flat, residential buildings are being acquired and converted into short-term rentals, displacing long-term residents and reshaping the district’s identity.
For months, a group of residents including 69-year-old architect Tonia Katerini has been digitally mapping foreign property purchases using public records, marking them with red dots. On her street, where the morning noise of arriving tourists with rolling suitcases replaces neighborhood sounds, Israeli investors have purchased multiple buildings, including the flat directly below hers.
In a district where Palestinian flags hang from balconies and political slogans cover nearly every wall, the demographic shift has fueled local friction. Activists have targeted converted buildings with red paint, splashing keypads and facades. Slogans painted across walls declare that short-term rentals leave residents homeless, while other messages reflect the complex geopolitical undercurrents of the local unrest.
Foreign capital has surged into Greek real estate in recent years. Non-residents invested a record 2.75 billion euros ($3.2bn) in Greek property in 2024, according to the Bank of Greece, before easing in subsequent periods. While official figures do not break down foreign buyers in Athens by exact nationality, an annual survey by the agency network RE/MAX Hellas indicated that Israelis constituted the largest group of foreign buyers in the Attica region surrounding the capital, ahead of investors from Turkiye and Lebanon.
Exarchia holds a storied place in modern Greek history. In 1973, students at the nearby Athens Polytechnic rose up against the US-backed military government, contributing to its fall the following year. Decades later, in 2008, the police shooting of 15-year-old student Alexandros Grigoropoulos in the neighborhood triggered nationwide protests. That deep-seated street anger later helped propel the left-wing Syriza party to power in 2015.
Local schoolteacher Chrysoulla Papageorgiou, who has lived in the neighborhood for 24 years, remembers Exarchia as a community built on solidarity. The pace of change accelerated after the COVID-19 pandemic, she said, when corporate entities began acquiring entire blocks. Tenants were quickly displaced, apartment blocks emptied, and traditional local businesses—including old bookshops, grocers, and cafes—shuttered to make way for bars and tourist infrastructure.
For years, residents sheltered refugees in occupied buildings across the neighborhood. However, authorities have since cleared most of those squats, leaving only a single occupied building draped in solidarity banners where neighbors help ensure children get to school. Since 2022, Exarchia Square, the traditional focal point for neighborhood gatherings and protests, has served as a fenced-off construction site for a contested metro station, accompanied by a daily police presence.
Real estate professionals defend the market shifts through practical economics. Vagelis Lazaridis, a branch head at the Athens-Attica Real Estate Agents’ Association, described Exarchia as a run-down area that presented a strong opportunity for investment due to its proximity to the city center, universities, and the metro system, alongside fewer building restrictions compared to historic districts like Plaka.
Nevertheless, the Greek government is taking steps to cool the property market. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced that the transfer tax for homebuyers from outside the European Union will increase from 3 percent to 15 percent starting next July. Real estate representatives note that the policy has yet to become law and could face delays, though agents expect some non-EU buyers to accelerate purchases ahead of any definitive deadline.
Additional regulatory shifts are already impacting transactions. Iryna Rondyak, an estate agent operating near Exarchia, noted that foreign buyers once accounted for roughly 70 percent of her sales until 2024, with Israeli clients making up a significant share of commercial building conversions into hotels. This year, foreign sales have dropped to about 30 percent, driven partly by state-backed mortgage schemes like “Spiti mou” that are drawing local buyers back into the market.
Furthermore, authorities have frozen the issuance of new short-term rental licenses in central Athens, including Exarchia, through the end of 2027. Properties acquired under Greece’s golden visa residency scheme are now restricted to long-term leases, though cheaper routes remain available for investors converting empty office buildings into residential apartments.
Despite these regulatory cooling measures, neighborhood residents remain skeptical. They argue that temporary rental freezes do little to reverse the widespread conversions that have already occurred, and that affluent investors continue to find alternative avenues into the market. For now, renters who remain rely heavily on unique local arrangements, such as landlords who reject steep rent increases as an act of resistance against the changing economic landscape.
