20 Mar 2009 12:28 PM:

Although we love Moraira town we found some of the property to the rear of El Portet to be very dismal, Cumbre del Sol and BenItachell are to be avoided at all costs. If you don't mind being a short drive from Moraira I can thoroughly recommend La Fustera on the Benissa coast road between Moraira and Calpe. We are looking to buy there, up the hill to the rear of the Fustera Supermarket, there are some stunning sea views up there and it is very quiet, but only a stones throw away from Moraira and Calpe.

This may not be what you want to hear, but property prices are holding up quite well in La Fustera, this is because it is such a nice residential area with no high rise development. Converely prices are plummeting in Cumbre del Sol and Benitachell because of them being so remote, perched on the top of very steep hillside. I prefer not to be totally dependent on a car and most often walk down to La Fustera Supermarket when we are staying at my mates villa.

Denia has always reminded me of a flat Calpe, and have you tried to park in Javea lately? Altea old town is still very nice some 30 years on from when we first visited it, however that's how we prefer to see it,on a visit. Calpe was lovely 30 years ago, it is now turning into a city, as all the sea front 1940's villas have passed on to decendents of the original owners and have been demolished and replaced by tower blocks of apartments. However we still like to walk on the prom from the south side of the rock to the fountain and have lunch at Alfredo's Capri. 

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17 Mar 2009 12:34 PM:

Well we haven't yet found our apartment  but the content of you guys posts doesn't surprise me. We saw a lovely apartment in a complex in La Fustera, just off the Benissa coast road, but it hadn't got it's own electricity meter. We now understand that each apartment does have it's own meter located somewhere in the basement of the complex. However each unit's supply comes via the complex's own supply and is charged out at a rate set by them. The complex has aparthotel status, is not fully sold and has unfinished facilities such as the indoor pool and gym, there are too many possible problems so we walked away from it.

Why is everything property related so complicated in Spain? We go out there, most of us abide by their laws (if we can understand or are aware of them), pay our dues and demands, create a lot of employment in their service industry and all that they offer us in return is complication after complication. Crooked officials appear to be the norm, they seem to delight in land grabs, what the hell is wrong with them?

A little off topic but why are the Guadia harassing folk in hire cars? Spot checks on the pretence of drink driving now leads to the driver having to show sufficient safety vests to match the number of seats, 2 warning triangles and a full set of duplicate light  bulbs, shouldn't this be a requirement of the hire firm to see that they are supplied? They are also operating on the spot fines if the driver does not have on him/her, driving licence, passport and car insurance certificate. My insurance certificate lives in the glove compartment but I'm damned if I'm going to risk losing or having stolen my passport and driving licence.

** EDITED - Please respect terms of posting **

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15 Jan 2009 1:32 PM:

Pat,

I read on another forum that the Spanish authorities are looking at over 60 days stays as a step towards residencia with all it's taxation implications. Also the usual maximum cover on an annual travel insurance policy is 60 days.

I may be wrong on the residencia issue but it's worth checking out.

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15 Jan 2009 12:13 PM:

gravitatingsouth, the wife and I have done all our homework, we not only know the area that we want to buy in, we know the actual development and the block. The large double balcony, 2 bed, 2 bath luxury apartments can be bought from the developer for 399,000 euros, we have tracked a re-sale down at 248,000 euros. This is not the right time to buy, my guess is that we will pick one up for circa 200,000 euros when the pound has strengthened to say 1.30 and UK house prices start rising.  Actually they are nor really falling as there are hardly any for sale, but if you have to sell at a discount you will also buy at a discount, so what's the problem?

The euro zone is in for a very unpleasant surprise when it finally extracts it's head from up it's arse and starts to separate the wheat from the chaff. Greece is a basket case, Italy, Spain, Ireland and Portugal aren't that far behind. Germans are now refusing to accept euros not printed in Germany, what does that tell you? Spain is hiding in a single currency bubble that will eventually burst and expose the rot inside.

If we manage to buy at a good price we intend to do 2 months in Spain and 2 months in the UK, we don't at this point wish to offer ourselves up for sacrifice to the Spanish taxation system and draconion bureaucracy that appears to abound. Not everything in the UK is bad and conversely not everything in Spain is good. 

 

This message was last edited by crookesey on 1/15/2009.

This message was last edited by crookesey on 1/15/2009.

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07 Jan 2009 12:18 PM:

Please forgive me if I am being simplistic but wouldn't a UK type Law Society sort out these injustices? If this happened in the UK the firm of solicitors that acted for the purchaser would face a professional indemnity claim and the possibility of being struck off for incompetence.

The buck has to stop somewhere, how can the purchasers be expected to know that they are buying an illegal property? The Spanish legal system would make an ideal subject for an episode of Monty Python, as would it's estate agents business practices. The Spanish economy is on it's knees and these foul practices still continue, Spanish building workers along with employees of associated industries are without work and the Spanish authorites still expect stupid folk to buy property that they know that they will eventually demolish.

Its time to join the real world Spain, you are hiding inside an all embracing single currency that is about to implode, you need all the financial input that you can get but still run your country on the lines of a Mickey Mouse South American dictatorship. Perhaps you moved on too quickly post Franco but still hung on to a legal system that Don Quixote would have been familiar with.

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