THERE WAS a time when Riviera estate agent Kirkor Ajderhanyan would have scheduled a trip to Dublin on his annual European tour promoting property on the seafront in Nice. However, this year Ajderhanyan, who has been selling property on the fabled Promenade des Anglais for over 20 years, has been visiting Mumbai, St Petersburg and Moscow instead, exhibiting apartments on the Promenade des Anglais, typically priced between €300,000 and €1 million.

Irish customers, who once accounted for up to 30 per cent of business at his agency, 107 Promenade, are no longer flying in to Nice in droves to snap up holiday apartments. In fact, now they are selling up. “Our Irish customers are now mainly sellers rather than buyers,” he said in an e-mail yesterday. “We can’t say that the Irish are all moving away from the Promenade des Anglais but they are looking very anxious.”

Adjerhanyan first started to sell apartments to the Irish around 2003, with sales gathering pace as property prices soared in Ireland. Typically, Irish buyers were middle-aged professionals and business people seeking large units in the Art Deco and Belle Epoque buildings that line the Nice seafront.

They favoured large, well-kept apartments with full sea views which ensured good rental prospects. During the summer months these could be rented out for up to €1,500 a month – but property owners counting on the sterling/euro differential have been hit by the fall in sterling.

And with Irish property values down by between 30 and 40 per cent, owners of overseas property are having to reconsider their investments.

“The majority of our Irish customers have asked us for valuations on their apartments in the last three or four months,” he said. “When they see that their properties are keeping their value or rising, they’re a little happier with their investment.” Should they have to sell up, Ajderhanyan insists that despite the global downturn there are always customers for frontline apartments.

“These days our buyers are mainly Italian, Indian, Danish and Russians, also French customers from the north of the country, who come to find the sunshine and mild climate.” Recent customers included Youri Baksheev, a former submarine officer, and Maria Zweiacker, a former bank manager from Los Angeles.