The blunt message to British people, and foreigners in general, when contemplating buying property in third-world countries, Bulgaria in particular, is watch out. Traditionally for British expats, France and Spain have been the favoured destinations for purchasing property, but lately their interested has gradually shifted towards the Balkans as new countries in the region have joined the European Union.

“Developers and real estate agents there have a more aggressive approach to property sales and our firm has dealt with hundreds of people who have encountered problems when buying property abroad,” David O'Donnell, who works for Irish-based legal firm Tom McGrath & Associates, said.

“A Bulgarian contract is hardly worth the paper that it is printed on. In some cases, buyers are signing contracts where the property is valued at much less than they are paying, in order to avoid more tax, at the behest of property agents.”

Common Bulgarian strategy is to declare a house worth, say, 130 000 euro at a meagre 20 000 or 30 000, so that once the transaction is made, the recipient of the money will not have to pay a massive tax on the whole sum to the government, but keep most of the cash for him/herself. The obvious and alarming problem with that, of course, is that Mr John Foreigner will end up with property which is officially worth on paper only 20 000 or so euro, which will have massive implications in the future.