09 Sep 2007 9:31 PM:

Hi again everyone,

So, we are back with an update on the website for advertising your apartments, for all those who have or are due to complete soon. The website is now ready and we are now in the process of adding new users.

The model as we said originally is not to charge owners so there is no fee to join up.

The service includes more than just a website, when you register with us you will also receive the following:-
    1. Property Rental documents which you can re-use to give to your holiday tenants.
    2. An on-line availability Calendar for your apartment.
    3. Access to a secure on-line owners forum where discreet discussions can be held between owners, without the general public reading the posts.
    4. Advice on how to market your property.
    5. Benefit from the advertising campaigns that we will be running for our website, targeting a few niche areas.

We already have a few people interested and they are in the process of getting their photos done and sending them onto us.

Interested?  Then let us know and we will send you the details of how to join up with us.

Kind regards
Michelle and Neil

Community thread: have a look

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10 Aug 2007 3:32 PM:

Houseclearou - We are always hearing on these threads that there are laws to help us, but honestly we have approached 3 different lawyers now and although the laws must be there, noone seems keen to take it on without a huge amount of cash being thrown at them again.  Latest quote from yesterday was £3,000 up front and costs at £256 per hour.  The other thing we were told, is that we only have 1 year from completion to take any action.  We are reluctant to really spend more money when we are not sure that we can even  trust the solicitors. 

Honestly I do feel stupid every time someone points out that we shouldn't have completed before we were satisfied, but we were told we would lose the deposit, not just by MLH/Interlaken etc but also two separate solicitors,  first one we sacked but then the next one said exactly the same thing and said that only if a dwelling is deemed uninhabitable can completion be delayed.  So items like, no roof, extreme damp, missing windows etc would apply, but just the "minor" things like no swimming pool and sports complex, no locking windows or doors, cracked sinks, crappy fittings and finish just weren't enough to delay the completion without losing the deposit.

By the way, if you are not a purchaser then who are you?  And how do you know what is legal and what's not if you haven't been through this process like the rest of us.  Not trying to be rude, just interested.

Norman - Have you been told that you have lost your deposit due to not completing?  Have you infact lost your apartment now and it's back up for sale again, or are they trying to resell it for you?

Gill - Who has bought Interlaken?

Community thread: baby car seats

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31 Jul 2007 1:46 PM:

Yeah great idea for those with a ground floor apartment, I assume that no one would object to us with the first floor apartments extending our balconies a little further out then also?

Come on guys let's get the complex sorted first before people start making changes which affect everyone, if you all start making changes which look different it could change the whole look of the complex and if it's not uniform would make it look awful.  You'll be telling us you want to stone clad it next.  Give us a break!


Myne

Community thread: 'Entidad Urbanistica'

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31 Jul 2007 1:01 PM:

Hi Norman and everyone else,

I wasn't going to post on the main thread because I think that as I am going to post that our apartment is the size that was stated in the contract it might just look like we were showing off. ;-)   Seriously,  we had our apartment measured before we completed by the guy who did our snagging. 

I thought you and others might be interested so you can compare it to yours, to see if the results are similar. He told us that he would measure it for us and that if it wasn't correct with the contract that he would get an architect to do it for us, as you need an architects report in order to take it to court.  He didn't want us to waste any more money as he knows that we are stretched on this financially, but he is an english guy who seems pretty trustworthy to us and he has been very helpful and is defnitely not in the builders pocket.  In our contract it states the following:-  (And I quote.)

"The property has a surface area of 71,68 squares metres and a terrace with a surface area of 11,40 square metres, including the corresponding part of common place of the building. "

In the measurements he took he got the following:-
 Built size - 69.43  Terrace - 12.8   ( He has included the common areas in his built size, which I know is crap, but apparently he said that this is common practice in Spain and so we wouldn't be able to claim that they shouldn't be included, although he also said that after our enquiry it did make him think again about it and so he measured the other apartments he was doing snagging on in other complex's and also his own apartment that he owns and the same thing was true for all of them, all the build sizes included a certain amount of common areas, which are outside your front door etc. 

So yes we are a couple of sq metres short on the build size but in order to make a claim our solicitor told us that there needs to be a difference of 5% or more than stated in the contract.  She also said that we would still have to complete anyway and then make a claim later.  It's all very frustrating as there doesn't seem to be much in place to protect the buyer, which is very different from over here in the UK.  Snagging in the UK is done before you complete and not after, which is where we are still stuck.  And we have a couple of quite major things which will be expensive to fix, we are still seeking legal advice on how to get the final snags completed.

As for the lack of sports complex, we were told that we couldn't delay completion because of this because this isn't mentioned in our contract as the contract is only for the apartment and not for the facilities on the site.  We again were told that we could try and claim later, but that it would take a long time, 2-3 years, it would be very expensive, (they asked for a €2,500 deposit before they would even start looking into it) and that there was not much chance of a success.  Of course we haven't entirely given up and we are looking into other solicitors to see if they could be more helpful, but cash flow is the problem for us if we are going to have to pay out another lump sum up front.

Did you really pay €425,000 for your apartment?  We paid €259,000 for our 2 bed first floor apartment, which I know is a lot more than others in earlier phases paid, but still seems a lot less than you paid.  We think we would be lucky to get €200,000 for it now, I know that there is one agency who has been selling apartments at a loss for people who have to just get rid quickly.  Do you want me to get the name of them for you, so you could speak to them? 

Cheers
Michelle & Neil
(Myne)


This message was last edited by myne on 7/31/2007.

This message was last edited by myne on 7/31/2007.
Community thread: baby car seats

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16 Jul 2007 12:00 AM:

We completed on an apartment in March, which was one year late.  We were told that we had to complete even though the snagging had not been completed and that the builders/deveopers would fix everything within 30 days.

We are now in July, and the snagging is still not complete and we don't know where to go for help. Our solicitors have said that it is nothing to do with them, we have to discuss with the developer.

We have visited, talked, emailed visited, shouted, screamed and almost cried but to no avail.  We are not unrealistic, we will fix some of the smaller things ourselves, but there are some fundamental things, like the fact that the drain access cover in the bathroom has been placed beneach the toilet so that it can not be removed and accessed.  The cooker hood is badly dented, the kitched unit doors are marked and even with cleaning, the marks can't be removed.  There is a huge hole in the living room wall where the AC vent is supposed to be and the windows and doors will not lock.  There is also a list of over a hundred other things on the list, which are smaller, like bad grouting etc which I think we can tackle ourselves, even if we shouldn't have to, but we just want to move on with this it is literally grinding us down.

For every week that they don't do anything we send them an invoice for loss of rental income, which of course they haven't paid, but we are really at a loss for how to get these last things fixed.

Is there a small claims court in Spain where we could take our problem?  Could we get everything fixed ourselves and then charge the cost back to the builder?  Is there anyway to get them to compensate us for loss of rental income?

They are clearly in breach of contract now, but they don't care as there doesn't seem to be anything we can do about it.   Surely we have rights too don't we?

Does anyone have any advice for how we can move this situation forward without costing us another small fortune?

Regards
Myne


This message was last edited by myne on 7/16/2007.
Forum thread: Where are our rights?

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