Where people are looking for a home in Portugal

How we measure

Sample

For homes, 6,467 people with saved home-buying searches on Explorador as of 2 November 2026, 4,839 of them with a budget. Each property type has its own sample, shown at the top of the page, and each percentage says how many people it is calculated over. We publish national totals only: never how many people search in each municipality, parish or district. These are people searching on Explorador, not a representative sample of every buyer in the country.

What counts

Saved searches to buy on Explorador, paused ones included. Each person counts once per municipality, however many searches they have. Closed accounts and Explorador staff and partners are excluded.

Demand level

It is relative within each district and per property type: each municipality is compared with the most searched one in its district, which sits at the top level. So the map shows where demand is strongest within each region, not which regions have more searches, which mostly reflects where Explorador is better known. A municipality with very high demand in one district therefore does not necessarily have more people searching than one with middle demand in another district. We show levels, from very high to low, and never numbers of people per municipality.

Demand by parish

It counts only the people who chose specific parishes or drew a small area, not those who chose the whole municipality, who are most of them. A parish only shows with a minimum of people searching it, and the level is relative within the municipality: the busiest parish is 100.

Drawn areas

An area drawn on the map counts in a municipality when it covers at least 10% of the municipality or 10% of the area. An area spanning more than 10 municipalities is too broad to place and counts only in its district, if it stays inside one, or in the national total.

Privacy

Municipalities with few searches are not shown, to protect the privacy of the people searching, and appear grey. We never show individual searches or how many people search in each place, only relative levels, medians, percentages and the national size of the sample.

Budget

The maximum price set on the search, between €20k and €5m. In each municipality, each person's highest budget counts. We show the median and the middle range only with at least 15 budgets, with fewer it shows n/a.

Asking price

The median asking price of the properties of the chosen type for sale in the municipality, each counted once even when listed on several portals and with the extremes trimmed, by the same method as our market price pages. It also needs at least 15 properties.

Within budget

The share of properties for sale in the municipality asking at most the median budget of the people searching there. It is the asking price in the listings, not the price homes sell for, compared with the budget of the people searching in that municipality.

Hardest and easiest

Municipalities ordered by the share of properties for sale asking at most the median budget of the people searching there, from lowest to highest. Only municipalities with both medians and at least 100 properties of the chosen type for sale. It is the only national ordering of municipalities on the page, and it orders prices against budgets: it does not say where more people are searching.

Price bands

Each person with a budget counts once, by the highest budget across their searches. Properties for sale are all those of the chosen type in the country, by asking price. A budget and a property of the same value sit in the same band. Percentages are rounded on the running total, so the bars up to any price add up exactly to the headline figure.

Where and what

Openness to several municipalities, drawn areas, minimum bedrooms, must-haves and land type: each share is of the people searching for the chosen type who filled in that field, not of everyone. For bedrooms we count the minimum each person asked for.

Buyer profile

Timing, financing, mortgage pre-approval, first home and a home to sell: each share is of those who answered that profile question, which is optional. A question with few answers is not shown.

Also search

For each municipality, the five municipalities that the most people searching there also search, from any district. We show only the order, without percentages, so as not to reveal how many people search each municipality.

Price cuts

Each week, the share of properties for sale both that week and the week before that cut their asking price. A portal only counts in weeks it was read in full, so a late re-read does not look like a wave of cuts. Moves above double or below half are left out as errors. We do not publish a price index: we only see properties still for sale, and such an index tends to fall even in a rising market.

Official data

From INE, per municipality: the median gross declared income per tax household in 2024 (indicator 0012712), which turns the median budget into years of income, the median value per m² of the homes sold in the last 12 months (0012234), the share of vacant dwellings in the 2021 Census (0012517) and the dwellings licensed in new buildings (0013235), also per thousand residents (0012917) and, nationally, by typology. The monthly payment is that of a 90% loan of the municipality's median budget over 30 years in equal instalments, at the implicit interest rate on new housing-credit contracts (0006339, 2.95% in September 2026), set against the median gross declared income per tax household divided by 12. It is an indicator, not a mortgage quote: it leaves out the 10% down payment, taxes and other costs. The change over a year compares the median value per m² of the homes sold in the latest quarter with the same quarter a year earlier. Sales are the homes sold in the last 12 months (0014363). Months of supply, under Homes only, divide the homes for sale seen on the portals we read in the last 30 days, each counted once, by a month of those sales. A listing that stopped appearing earlier does not count. Our listings are not every home for sale, so the figure is indicative. Listings and official figures do not describe the same homes or the same period, so the comparisons are indicative.

Updated

Data as of 2 November 2026. Price history starts on 18 June 2026.