All eyes on Mauritius: new residential resorts on idyllic Indian Ocean island are ticking all the boxes for international buyers

Mark Twain said Mauritius must be the template for heaven and the 140,000 Britons who holiday there each year probably agree.

The Indian Ocean island 12 hours from London ticks the boxes for a tropical idyll: blue skies and tranquil seas, palm trees and golden sand and top grade personal and economic safety that dramatically outperforms most Caribbean islands.

Since 2002, foreign buyers have been allowed to purchase homes in selected large resorts.

Those investing a minimum £395,000 received Mauritian residency along with a low-tax regime with zero inheritance or capital gains taxes.

Since modified, the rules now allow smaller projects to qualify and so far 2,672 international buyers have bought homes.

London-based developer David Rich-Jones, winner of an Evening Standard New Homes award, has owned property at Anahita, an established resort in the east, for over 10 years.

His latest project, a super-luxe staffed six-bedroom villa on the golf course, lets for £65,000 a week.

“Mauritius offers so much away from the wonderful beaches including extensive mountains, 11 golf courses and great schools and hospitals,” he says.

“For me Anahita is the best resort on the island. It has invested hugely in its infrastructure, while a new road is planned that will reduce the journey to Grand Baie from 75 minutes to 25.”

Anahita, one of Mauritius’s first residential resorts, is set in landscaped grounds on four miles of waterfront with access to the island’s largest lagoon.

There’s a 90-room Four Seasons Hotel with branded villas, two championship golf courses, a spa, nine restaurants and 220 completed and sold homes.

Fully furnished freehold resale homes for sale through Chestertons International include two-bedroom flats of 1,936sq ft for £578,000 and three-bedroom townhouses for £772,000.

Three- and four-bedroom villas start from £1,136,000. These elegant, high-quality homes in gardens full of banyan trees, hibiscus and palms have full maintenance and rental management.

Newly released off-plan homes on the northern side of Anahita, a short buggy ride from the central restaurants and shops, are more modern.

Plots start from £395,000 with four- and five-bedroom golf-view villas from £1,107,000.

Further north, an hour from the airport and close to Grand Baie tourist resort, Azuri is a newer 200-acre spot with 376 homes built and plans for 380 more.

Off-plan two-bedroom flats in the latest phase start from £350,000 and three-bedroom villas from £600,000. Monthly service charges average £333 and furniture packages start at £24,250.

“For over half of our owners Azuri is their main base and 20 per cent of foreign buyers live here full time,” says chief executive Christine Marot.

“More than just a residential resort, it is a village community, something that doesn’t exist elsewhere on Mauritius.”

Azuri has a 100-room Radisson Blu hotel, restaurants, shops, a small marina and a new nursery school.

A nine-hole golf course is being built and there are five 18-hole courses within 20 minutes.

Jewellers Kate and Forbes Mavros have lived on Mauritius for 12 years, raising their daughters Azaan and Esmae, five and two, and creating magnificent pieces for their family studios, Patrick Mavros, in Harare, Nairobi and Fulham Road, Chelsea.

“Mauritius is a very special place to live,” says Kate. “It’s safe, multilingual and everyone mixes in so well. The arts scene is coming alive with a new theatre in Port Louis that hosts plays, jazz festivals and ballets.”

Patrick Mavros manufactures in Mauritius, last year opening a restored 180-year old sugar mill as a shop and atelier where artisans work with green turquoise from Iran, black moonstone from Tanzania and garnet from South Africa.

Ceramics by Forbes’s aunt, Fée Halsted, are also sold there and her vivid wallpaper for Cole & Son is in perhaps the Indian Ocean’s most exotic loo.

“So much has changed since I first arrived,” says Kate. “A growing food movement focuses on small farms and organic produce and we have performing arts, music festivals and exhibitions.”