Real estate transactions in Bulgaria tumbled by 35 per cent year-on-year in the first half of 2009, data from the Registry Agency showed.

The downtrend swept across all major cities and seaside resorts, with Sofia, Varna and Samokov region, including upscale winter resort Borovets, collapsing by around 50 per cent.

Brokers blamed lagging investment activity and the global financial downturn.

Recently, Raiffeisen Real Estate said in a report that property deals had shed an average of 42 per cent nationwide and 58 per cent in the capital city.

The agency's report also took off-plan transactions into account, which boomed only two years ago.

The real estate sector was sluggish in the seaside resort of Sunny Beach, where mass construction began eight to 10 years ago and most off-plan purchases have been completed, Pepa Astinova, manager of Victoria Pirin Invest agency, said.

The National Association of Municipalities said that, based on contributions to municipal budgets, property deals across the country had halved.

Roumen Rashev, mayor of the central town of Veliko Tarnovo, said receipts had slumped by more than two thirds.

The estimates of the Registry Agency mimics figures from Sofia municipality, which said deals in the first six months of 2009 fetched only 30 million leva, compared to 59 million leva in the same period of 2008.

Mortgaged properties' foreclosures crept up by 36.6 per cent year-on-year, according to the agency. At the same time, new mortgages shrank almost threefold to 14 000.