Tanaiste Michael McDowell was urged earlier this year to clamp down on the way that overseas property is advertised, amid growing evidence that the risks involved are all too often glossed over. But no action has yet been taken to rein in an industry that remains completely unregulated.

The Hungarian capital, Budapest, is a firm favourite with Irish investors while some of the newer money is finding its way to Thailand's beach resorts.

The political upheavals have put both currencies under pressure leaving Irish investors in a bind.

As the currencies slide, so too will their value of their investments. But the mortgages used to buy them, often secured against their homes, are typically in euro and so remain unchanged.

The week's events should serve as a wake-up call for people piling into property in far-flung places says Brendan Burgess, founder of askaboutmoney. com, an online discussion board dealing with investment issues.

"The further away from home you invest, the riskier it gets, " he says. "I wouldn't have thought of Hungary or Thailand as politically risky but you just never know. It makes you wonder about investing in places like Cape Verde, which most people know nothing about."

Having seen the money than can be made, many people no longer see property as a safe bet but as a sure thing says Frank O'Dwyer, chief executive of the Irish Association of Investment Managers. His organisation, which represents the tightly-regulated fund management industry, has led calls for a crackdown on property advertising and in particular claims about the potential returns on offer.

"When people go overseas, they often pay scant attention to the basics such as their tax and legal position. So it's no surprise that the risk of political stability is ignored completely, " he says.

"While it's not a risk you'd associate with every destination, it is an issue in some places."

Even when the locals are not rioting in the streets and the army stays confined to barracks, the political landscape can still change overnight for investors, O'Dwyer says.

They only have to cast their minds back to the Bacon proposals, which led the government at home to lock investors out of the housing market in the hope that it would help first-time buyers. "Governments regularly use the tax system to achieve public policy goals. We've done it in Ireland and emerging economies will do it too, " he says. "The trouble is that, when you're distant from a market and the market is changing rapidly, you can't stay on top of what's going on."

O'Dwyer believes there is something to be learned from the well-heeled investors in commercial property, who tend to keep their money much closer to home. According to Richard Ellis Gunne, two-thirds of Irish investment in European commercial property is in established markets such as France, Germany and the Benelux countries. Only 5% of their money is in emerging countries such as Hungary.

"Private investors seem prepared to take much greater risks in the hope of doubling or trebling their money whereas the more sophisticated investor seems prepared to take lower returns, " he says. "They seem to have a completely different view of what's an acceptable trade off between risk and reward."