Marbella East has been the lower-profile end of the Marbella property map for years, characterised by quieter residential pockets, established communities and a calmer pace than the Golden Mile or Puerto Banús. That positioning is being materially reshaped by a coordinated wave of major hospitality and branded-residence projects, several of which crossed important planning thresholds during May 2026. For buyers approaching the market in 2026, the question is no longer whether the area deserves a serious look, but how to position relative to a sub-market in the early stage of a structural lift.
A late-May piece in the Olive Press, authored by Christopher Clover of Panorama Properties, set out the projects in motion. The most recent headline is the approval of the Las Dunas resort in Las Chapas, on a beachfront plot of more than 160,000 square metres, with an investment of over 350 million euros and plans for a five-star hotel, branded residences, a beach club and full resort-style services. Marbella Town Hall licensed the project in May 2026, alongside a parallel regeneration of the Dunas de Marbella ecological reserve at Real de Zaragoza. This makes Las Dunas an area-level infrastructure project rather than a single building.
The projects defining the next decade in Marbella East
The Las Dunas approval sits within a broader programme. The Four Seasons Marbella resort in Río Real represents an investment of around 700 million euros and is expected to combine roughly 120 hotel keys with up to 166 private residences, landscaped grounds, wellness facilities and a substantial package of infrastructure improvements. Pre-sales are currently estimated for 2027 and first deliveries from 2029, subject to final planning and licensing. Further inland, the former Marbella Golf Country Club has been acquired by Higuerón Developments and rebranded as the Higuerón Marbella Golf Resort, with the wider project expected to include the Waldorf Astoria Marbella, the brand’s first property in Spain.
Established hospitality assets in the area are being renewed alongside the new ones. The Don Carlos Marbella in Elviria reopened for the 2026 season after a major renovation that includes the Rafa Nadal Tennis Centre. The Kimpton Los Monteros Marbella has brought IHG’s international luxury lifestyle brand to the Los Monteros area, with the La Cabane Beach Club now operated in collaboration with Dolce and Gabbana. The Incosol Marbella in Río Real is planned to return as a 168-room health, wellness and longevity hotel under a reported 87.4 million euro investment. The former Residencia de Tiempo Libre de Marbella, a 197,500 square metre site listed in the Catálogo General del Patrimonio Histórico de Andalucía, has been provisionally awarded to Ritusa S.A. of the Fuerte Group under a long-term agreement, with the site remaining publicly owned by the Junta.
Where current pricing sits relative to the Golden Mile
The asking-price gap between Marbella East and the western luxury catchments is wider in 2026 than the underlying fundamentals justify. Idealista data referenced in the Olive Press piece places Nagüeles and the Golden Mile at approximately 6,872 euros per square metre and Nueva Andalucía with Puerto Banús at around 5,978 euros per square metre. The Marbella East comparators sit beneath both. Río Real and Los Monteros trade at approximately 5,294 euros per square metre, Las Chapas and El Rosario at around 5,572 euros per square metre, and Elviria and Cabopino at 4,514 euros per square metre. The most accessible sub-area within Marbella East therefore prices at roughly two thirds of the Golden Mile average, despite the wave of luxury hospitality investment now arriving on its coastline.
What hospitality investment typically does to a sub-market
Branded-residence and five-star hotel anchors of the scale arriving in Marbella East have a measurable effect on surrounding asking prices over a five to ten year horizon. The mechanism is straightforward. International luxury hospitality brings a more visible, audited buyer pool to a sub-market, raises the calibration point for new development specification, and pulls the surrounding professional infrastructure of estate agents, lawyers and project managers towards the area. In comparable European luxury coastlines the lift has typically run between 15 and 25 per cent on stock within one to two kilometres of the anchor projects, with the strongest effect on properties already finished to current luxury standards at the point the projects break ground.
The Marbella East situation has the unusual feature of multiple anchor projects arriving at roughly the same time, which compresses what would normally be a phased lift into a tighter window. Buyers who decide on the area in 2026, before the Four Seasons pre-sales open and before the Las Dunas works become visible from the road, are therefore likely to be entering on the last full cycle of pre-repositioning asking prices.
Where the value sits within Marbella East
Within the Marbella East catchment, the three sub-areas now trade at distinct positions. Río Real and Los Monteros at 5,294 euros per square metre sit closest to the Four Seasons anchor and the planned Incosol wellness resort, with established residential layouts, golf-course frontage and direct beach access. Las Chapas and El Rosario at 5,572 euros per square metre carry the most immediate exposure to the Las Dunas project and the regenerated Dunas de Marbella reserve. Elviria and Cabopino at 4,514 euros per square metre represent the deepest current value, with proximity to the renovated Don Carlos hotel and to the inland Higuerón project.
The right choice between them depends on a buyer’s view on construction timing, on whether the value driver is from a single nearby anchor or from a broader area effect, and on personal preference between newer build and the established 1970s and 1980s Marbella East stock that has now reached the renovation phase. For buyers oriented toward immediate occupation rather than off-plan exposure, the secondary market in Río Real and Las Chapas is currently active and offering a depth of inventory that the Golden Mile no longer provides.
Taken together, the wave of projects should be read as a coordinated repositioning rather than a one-project story. Several major schemes are arriving at once, the gap to the Golden Mile and Puerto Banús is the widest it is likely to be for the next ten years, and the next eighteen months represent the cleanest window for entering on current secondary-market asking prices. For international buyers approaching Marbella property in 2026, the area now figures more prominently than it has at any point in the past decade when set alongside the broader picture of the 10 most exclusive luxury areas in Marbella, and the buyer who acts on the structural read rather than the historical perception is the one who will be measured against the next phase of the Costa del Sol’s premium market.
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