"speculator"?
seriously?
no- I own ONE apartment in buenos aires, and I live in it.
and the examples I talk about are not from speculators.
in any real estate market, there are always good deals and bad deals.
there are always places that are overpriced, or are in bad locations, or are not very nice, that will not appreciate much.
but in the "money crescent", ranging from San Telmo to Belgrano, I can come up with example after example of apartments that have doubled in value in the last 5 to 8 years.
I look at real estate all the time, even though I am not buying, as a kind of hobby.
I know that 5 or 6 years ago, you could buy apartments in villa crespo for well under $100k USD, and that those same apartments now are going for much more- maybe not yet double, but 50% to 75% more.
The palermo examples I gave have nothing to do with "speculation"- they are casas chorizo, and people who own them live in them, in most cases, although some of them are now small boutiques or restaurants, which has helped them to be worth more.
But even on the "wrong" side of Scalabrini, near Honduras and, say, Arraoz, an average pre second world war freestanding house is easily worth double today what it was a few years ago.
I have no experience with barrios outside of Gnl Paz- and it would not surprise me at all if prices there have gone up less.
But in the center of town, I know of many many examples of prices going up far more than a few percent.
Entire neighborhoods have changed dramatically in the last few years. Prices have followed.
I know people who used to live in Palermo or Barrio Norte, who are now in Barracas, or Villa Crespo, as the prices of real estate march up farther and farther south.
The area south of Corrientes was very very cheap five years ago- now, near Cementario Chacarita, its booming, with tons of new art galleries, trendy restaurants, and stores, and home prices are going up.
I have bought and sold a lot of houses, buildings, and land, in the USA over my lifetime always using it myself, not speculation- and I know that ALWAYS you have to consider the neighorhood, the trends, the character and condition of the building- if you dont, you dont see any rise in value.
I made money on a studio building I owned in South Central LA- because it was the "right" building, the neighborhood had a terrible rep.
And if you bought the right building in La Boca, or Boedo, or other not so trendy barrios here, you could still do well. If not, not.