Articles

We Brits often have a love hate relationship with the Mediterranean climate.  We love the sun, but we are often not so keen on the heat.  Blue skies cheer us up, but the antidote to the warm side effect of the blazing sun is a lovely blue pool to dive into when the thermometer seems as if it is about to burst.  In fact, a pool is almost always an essential requirement of anyone buying a property on or near the Spanish coast. 

If you buy on a development then there will always be a communal pool, but if you are considering purchasing a detached house on a plot, then you will be broadening your options if you consider building your own pool, whether because no pool has been built at a house that you fancy, or because the pool already built there is not exactly what you were after.  While building a whole house from scratch is a bit of a task in Spain, even for a native Spaniard, building a pool is not quite as onerous and is far less likely to go wrong.

When buying an apartment in Spain, or a house which forms part of a development, you will often hear talk of a “Communidad de Propietarios” or “Community of Property Owners” and the service charges that can form part of the running costs of owning a property in Spain.  What is this mysterious “community”? And how does it impact upon you as a property owner in Spain?

 Almost anyone who purchases a property in England or Wales will entrust the legal aspects of the transaction to a solicitor, either a specialist conveyancer, or a general practitioner, but in any event a qualified independent legal adviser protecting the interests of the purchaser.  Only people with previous experience of property purchases and considerable knowledge of property law ought to contemplate handling their own transactions and even then it makes little sense to do.  That is because by engaging a solicitor not only should you be guaranteed that the purchase will be handled competently, but if a professional adviser makes an error that causes the purchaser damages, there ought to be a professional indemnity insurance policy to cover the loss.

The same principle applies to buying a property in Spain.  Before you make any payment either to a seller or to an estate agent you need to engage an independent Spanish lawyer to advise and assist you in respect of the purchase. 

Spanish immigration rules currently provide for people from countries outside of the EU to apply for permission to reside in Spain for one of a number of reasons.  As the transition period has now ended, UK nationals continue to be able to to spend short or extended periods in Spain provided they comply with the rules.

For many who attempted to purchase property off-plan in Spain and who found that the property was not completed, it has been an uphill struggle to reclaim deposits paid to developers.  This year new hope emerged for those affected when the Spanish government applied a law to allow investors to reclaim deposits for unbuilt off-plan properties in Spain.  

Here we take you through the background to the law regulating deposits paid for off-plan properties in Spain.  We also analyse why some investors found themselves in difficulties following the economic downturn.  Finally we explain the current position when it comes to reclaiming deposits paid for unbuilt off-plan properties in Spain.