can anyone help, if a builder has gone more than 6 months over on a contract date are we legally obliged to some form of compensation. CAN WE INSIST ON IT.

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Of course you need to be compensated. The extensions on contract deadlines need to be notified and accepted by you, expressly, if not they are in breach of contract and you can ask for compensation and even cancellation of contract and devolution of amounts and interests.

_______________________

Maria L. de Castro, JD, MA

Lawyer

Director www.costaluzlawyers.es

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Hi Mags,

As Maria will tell you, it's ILLEGAL for a builder in Spain NOT to give a Bank Guarantee when you're buying off-plan. I realize this advice doesn't help you if he sticks to his guns & you have a solicitor who won't act better for you. That's the law re Bank guarantees anyway, they're in place so you can't lose any of your money. Some builders DON'T arrange this with a bank BUT you can buy one yourself if necessary. You need to consult your solicitor & I hope he DOES help you. I'll follow the thread hoping to hear better news from you. Good luck.

Janice

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Janice, can you explain bank guarantee? Is it just if developer goes bust? like ours keeps saying he is going bankrupt???

John and Trish Amarion lll Almoradi

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It's just an insurance basically, John & Trish. The bank, who the builder should've lodged the guarantee with, guarantees your payments are safe IF you have a guarantee, which it seems, many don't. We weren't automatically given one but were told by our agent, AFTER WE PRESSED HIM MANY TIMES FOR AN ANSWER TO OUR QUESTION ON INSPECTION TRIP ABOUT IT, every builder selling new builds off plan with stage payments involved MUST BY LAW give a Bank guarantee. We bought after hearing that was so but there was NO mention of being CHARGED for the guarantee !!  It came to light very quickly that we were expected to pay for this so we complained that we'd been duped (pretty much) & the agent eventually "offered" to pay for it. Our financial breakdown, on completion, had 1248 € on it that they expected us to pay till we reminded them (keep all paperwork) that they said they'd pay that. This price covered the period from the day we signed the contract on 5th September, 2003 to our completion date of 20th April, 2005 which is a much shorter build time than you hear about.

Janice

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Hi guys, thanks for the info. Learnt something new there!

John and Trish

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Hi folks

we are in a similar position, court case coming up due to several huge breaches of contract, no LFO etc, but we only learned last year that we also never did have a BG,........good lawyer we had eh', not sure how that will affect our case?

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Mariadecastro

Not sure usually the contract will say that they builders have to complete thwe works from either the day they actually started or the day they actuall got the planning consent for the build.  Check the contract

Tricia F

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So,what happens if you buy and pay deposit through toital ignorance??? as most people do?? have tried emailing you on your business site quite a few weeks ago to act for us,but obviously email was not received by you?

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I really feel like I'm out on  limb here! desperate to move  and should be moving now,but no property for 2 years and  more!!

would like Maria to get in touch as have tried to get in touch through this site, but obviously had no luck and have sent personal messages too, but without reply?

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MagsB, I am guessing that Maria is very busy these days!

Have you tried emailing her directly at marialuisa@costaluzlawyers.es?

Justin

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Maria L. de Castro, JD, MA

Lawyer

Director www.costaluzlawyers.es

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Hi Maria, have emailed through the link from EOS Team,so hope you get this one,if not,could you PM me please.

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Does anybody know if there is a compensation scale according to how long construction is delayed by? Or is it a case of throwing figures in the air and seeing what comes down?

Alan

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Hi everyone

Unfortunately we are in a similar position.  Our contract with the builders states that we are entitled to a full refund of deposit plus interest if the build is more than six months past its original completion date.  It is now 9th months past this date with the build only just at the foundation stage and very little ongoing work.  The builder will not co-operate with our Solicitor and today he has advised me to forward to the courts to apply for a refund.  Has anyone actually won through the courts?  If so I would love to hear about your experiences, good and bad, to enable me to pursue as quickly as possible.  (if that's possible in Spain!)

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sharlu

we are in a similar position, though our appartment was well over two years late!, not built to the contract specification and now, four and a half years after putting our deposit down, still has no LFO. Despite all this, many still completed, partly due to waiting so long, partly due to the worry that the developer may go bust while we waited for the right paperwork to be in place and partly through bad advice from the agent and lawyer. We have now found a good lawyer to take our several breaches of contract to court. The first one said we should complete and then claim afterwards, which was i realise now,  the worst bit of advice we ever had, and from someone we assumed was  working for us???

We know we are in the right and are now quite confident of a win. (if we dont come up agaist a corrupt judge). The very helpful lawyers, Maria on this site and Drakan on SPI have both been great in advising us on good lawyers and explaining our legal position. I'm told the tide is turning, and some developers are now settling 'out of court', as so many of them have been proved wrong.

Best of luck, and if i remember, i'll let you know how and when our case moves forward.

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