This new figure allows the individual entrepreneur prevent, under certain conditions, liability for business or professional debts to affect his family home.

Requirements: 

1.  Home house cannot be linked to operations of the business

2. Value cannot be higher than 300,000 Euros

3. It needs to be communicated and  specified to Company Registry  when registering as and Entrepreneur

4. It needs to be registered in the Land Registry.

All this can be processed  through electronic means in less than 12 business hours. 

Liability restriction  does not covers:

1) Previous debts

2) Non professional or business obligations.

3) Public Law debts (Taxes or Social Security)

Public law claims just can affect homes if: 

- No other assets can be enforced

- Two years have passed between initial notification of seizure and actual

"Casa en el numero 3 de la Plaza Aliatar", El Albayzin, Granada, Southeastern Spain, by Landahlauts, at flickr.com

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Financial Justice

http://elpais.com/elpais/2013/07/09/inenglish/1373371128_743177.html

The British buyers fight back

Foreign property investors are battling to recover money lost in deals gone bad

Rafael Méndez – El País English Edition - 9 JUL 2013 - 14:20 CET 

Keith Rule says that he first thought about buying a house in Spain after a friend told him about an advertisement he had seen in an easyJet in-flight magazine for a property development in Hellín, called Finca Parcs-Las Higuericas, in Albacete province. The year was 2006, the height of the country's property boom.

"It was being sold as 'the real Spain'," says Rule. The development was not on the coast, but inland, in a lovely place," explains Rule on the phone from the UK.

Finca Parcs-Las Higuericas was going to consist of 617 chalets with their own swimming pools. Few of the 300 or so British or Irish investors who put down a deposit knew the area, but the layout plans and artist's impressions looked good, the price was right... what could go wrong?

Spain's property market collapsed in early 2008, taking with it hopes that Finca Parcs-Las Higuericas would ever materialize. The company behind the project, Cleyton Ges, went bankrupt, and Keith Rule began to worry that he would never get back the 53,434 euros he had put down, much less get his Spanish vacation home. The bank that had acted as intermediary in the promotion, CAM, was in serious financial difficulties of its own: it was unable to finance the operation, and would not return the money it had taken. He contacted a lawyer, who told him to sue Cleyton Ges. "But I knew that this wouldn't get me my money back. I looked on the internet and using the little Spanish I have, discovered that there was a law from 1968 stating that the bank was also responsible."

Using my Spanish, I found a 1968 law saying that the bank was responsible"

The little-known legislation that Rule uncovered details procedures in the case of deposits put down on the construction and sale of dwellings, and outlines in clear terms the guarantees that a home buyer is entitled to. The preamble states that the law was passed in response to "the justified alarm among the public caused by repeated abuses, which on the one hand, are a threat to social stability, and on the other, are clear breaches of the law."

The law was designed to avoid the repetition of cases such as Nueva Esperanza, a property developer that took money from more than 10,000 savers without ever building a single home. "The measures we are taking are meant to resolve an indignant problem, because people that had spent a lifetime saving to buy an apartment saw their money disappear overnight, and were left with no home," said the then-housing minister, according to the newspaper Abc . The law not only required the property developer to return buyers' money, but required the bank to guarantee that any amounts it received were spent on construction. The bank would, from now on, have to supervise the money and provide a guarantee "under its own responsibility." In other words, if a bank takes your money as a deposit on a property, if that property is not built, it is responsible for returning your money.

When the property market collapsed, lawyer Javier Domínguez Romero was contacted by people who, like Keith Rule, were in danger of losing their deposits, and who had also looked at the 1968 law. "The law had been forgotten about for years during the economic boom. Few lawyers even knew about it," says Domínguez, who later published a book on the subject.

Around the same time, Keith Rule had begun looking for a Spanish lawyer who would handle his lawsuit, as well as those of 46 other would-be home owners. Eventually he met with Jaime de Castro, a Gibraltar-based lawyer used to representing British clients within the Spanish legal system. The trial was held in May 2012. CAM tried delaying tactics by saying that all those bringing charges must appear in person in court. All 47 made the trip to Albacete provincial court, although none of them were questioned by CAM's legal team. CAM's argument was simple. It had no "legal relationship" with the 47, and said they would have to pursue their case against the property developer. The bank did not have guarantees for each depositor, as it was required to do so by law, should there be any problem with the construction.

The judge hearing the case agreed that CAM was indeed responsible and ordered it to return the 1.5 million euros that the British had paid to the developer: "CAM knew that the deposits placed in accounts in its branches were from the buyers of a property development and completely abandoned its responsibilities to them under the 1968 legislation, and as such committed bad banking practices." The sentence has since been ratified, and the British investors are getting their money back, with interest and costs. CAM, which has been taken over by Banco Sabadell, has not appealed against the ruling. The bank says that it inherited the problem. The British embassy says that it will use the ruling for future cases.

Rule, who is now working with the legal team that won the case, says that the ruling should give hope to anybody who has lost money to a property developer. "This law, after 45 years, is more necessary than ever," he says. He has set a precedent that in general terms provides much greater protection to consumers, because the bank has to pay, even if there is no guarantee.

Similar cases have emerged in recent months of foreign investors getting their money back from bankrupt property developers. Alec Edwards works for the Liverpool fire brigade. In 2009, he put down 150,000 euros as a deposit on a property in Trampolin Hills, in Murcia. "We could see that there was no building work, so we asked the bank to execute the guarantee, which it refused to do." Two months ago, after bringing legal action, he got all of his money back. His lawyer, Guadalupe Sánchez, says that British people are more inclined to take legal action. "Spaniards do not like taking on the banks, but the British seem to have no fear," she explains. Antonio Flores, a Malaga-based lawyer who specializes in construction disputes involving non-Spaniards, agrees: "These people really put their foot down, and demanded a response from the system."

Spanish judges are at last beginning to do something to improve the country's poor reputation inEurope. In March, the Supreme Court demanded that foreigners buying here be given special protection. Rule says that he is happy, not just for himself: "Spain has shown that it is a serious country, and that if you insist, the justice system works."

FINCA PARCS - BBC RADIO INTERVIEWS

BBC Radio 4 Interview with Keith Rule (Finca Parcs Action Group) & Jaime de Castro (Costa Luz/De Castro) first broadcast on 27 May 2013 after the Sentence against Banco CAM was definitive and final:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01b1tft


BBC Radio 4 Interview with Keith Rule (Finca Parcs Action Group) & Gerard M Vazquez (Lawyer from VAZQUEZ ESTUDIO JURIDICO) first broadcast 11 July 2012 following the victory in the First Instance Court – June 2012:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00vymv3

ARTICLE IN EL PAÍS - SUNDAY 7 JULY 2013

http://politica.elpais.com/politica/2013/07/05/actualidad/1373051752_595536.html
 

Compradores de promociones fantasma recuperan el dinero por una ley de 1968

Los jueces culpan a la banca de incumplir la normativa, que les hace también responsables

El banco debe garantizar que las cantidades que recibe el promotor van a la construcción

Rafael Méndez – El País - Madrid - 7 JUL 2013 - 00:00 CET

Keith Rule recuerda que un amigo le pasó un anuncio que había visto en una revista de Easyjet sobre unas casas en Hellín (Albacete). Era 2006 y no había posibilidad de equivocarse al comprar casa en España. “Lo vendían como ‘la verdadera España’. No era un resort en la costa, sino en el interior, en Albacete, en un sitio muy bonito”, recuerda hoy por teléfono desde Londres. “Finca Parcs-Las Higuericas” se llamaba la promoción. Iban a ser 617 chalés con piscina en el campo. No era el destino habitual y a pesar de eso atrajo a unos 300 británicos e irlandeses que dieron un anticipo por la vivienda. Compraron sobre plano, cuando aún no había nada. Keith, que tiene una lavandería, pensaba pasar temporadas en España.

Pero pronto vio que algo se había torcido. De arriba abajo, la explosión de la burbuja inmobiliaria llegó inexorable a Hellín. Y la promotora, Cleyton Ges, se quedó sin dinero para las cinco fases. Era 2008 y Keith vio que los 53.434 euros que había dado como anticipo estaban en serio riesgo. Ni la CAM, la caja que había recogido todos los ingresos, podía financiar la obra ni devolvía el dinero. Keith comenzó a consultar a abogados. “Me decían que demandara al promotor, pero sabía que así no recuperaría mi dinero. Busqué en Internet con el poco español que sabía y vi que había una ley de 1968. La traduje con Google y leí que el banco también era responsable”.

La ley es la 57/1968 “sobre percibo de cantidades anticipadas en la construcción y venta de viviendas”. Se trata de una concisa norma, dos folios y siete artículos, que da todo tipo de garantías al comprador de viviendas. La ley explica que surge por “la justificada alarma que en la opinión pública ha producido la reiterada comisión de abusos, que, de una parte, constituyen grave alteración de la convivencia social y, de otra, evidentes hechos delictivos”.

La norma pretendía evitar casos como el de la sociedad Nueva Esperanza, que en los años sesenta se llevó el dinero de más de 10.000 ahorradores sin levantar los pisos prometidos. “Las medidas tomadas vienen a resolver un problema indignante, ya que gente que estaba ahorrando toda su vida para hacerse con un piso se veía de la noche a la mañana con el dinero perdido y sin vivienda”, declaró entonces un portavoz del Ministerio de Vivienda, según recogió el diario Abc. La ley no solo exige al promotor la devolución del dinero, sino que dice que el banco debe garantizar que las cantidades que este recibe deben ir a la construcción. El banco debe fiscalizar el destino del dinero y exigir un aval “bajo su responsabilidad”. Esos derechos, según la norma, son “irrenunciables”.

Con el desplome de la burbuja, el abogado Javier Domínguez Romero comenzó a recibir consultas de gente que se había quedado pillada en promociones a medias y se estudió la ley de 1968. “La norma había dormido el sueño de los justos durante los tiempos de bonanza económica. Los abogados apenas recurríamos a ella”. Publicó un libro sobre la ley y desde entonces ha perdido la cuenta del número de ejecuciones de avales que ha llevado.

Por esa época, Keith Rule comienza su lucha. Quiere ir más allá. Recuperar el dinero aunque el promotor ni había depositado los avales para 100 de los compradores. No llega a encontrar a Domínguez. De hecho, le costó dar con un abogado dispuesto a ir contra la CAM —“me llamaban loco”—, hasta que con 46 compradores convenció a Jaime de Castro, de un bufete de Algeciras especializado en clientes británicos. El juicio se celebró en mayo de 2012 y fue un espectáculo. La CAM pidió que fueran todos los demandantes, con lo que 47 familias británicas e irlandesas se desplazaron hasta Hellín, aunque luego su representante no les hizo preguntas. El argumento de la caja era que no tenía “ninguna relación jurídica” con los británicos, que estos debían reclamar al promotor, que no tenía los avales a los que le obligaba la ley por si no finalizaba las casas. Sin embargo, la juez consideró que el banco también era responsable. Hace un año, les dio la razón y ordenó a la CAM que devolviera 1.494.710 euros que los británicos habían dado a la inmobiliaria. Argumentó que “la CAM conocía que los anticipos ingresados en cuentas abiertas en sus sucursales se trataban de ingresos a cuenta de compradores de una promoción inmobiliaria e hicieron dejación absoluta de sus obligaciones que como entidad financiera le impone la ley 57/68 incurriendo su conducta en una mala praxis bancaria”.

La Audiencia Provincial ratificó la sentencia hace un mes y los británicos ya están cobrando, y con intereses y costas, lo pagado. La CAM, hoy parte del Sabadell, ni recurrió al Supremo, como confirma un portavoz. El banco considera este caso uno más de la herencia envenenada que dejó la caja. La Embajada británica afirma en una carta que lo usará como guía para casos similares. Keith, que ahora colabora con el bufete que llevó el caso, sostiene que su sentencia da una nueva esperanza a quienes han enterrado dinero en la burbuja inmobiliaria: “Esta ley es, 45 años después, más necesaria que nunca”. Domínguez sienta un precedente que, de generalizarse, daría mucha más protección al consumidor, ya que el banco paga incluso si no hay aval. Y podría abrir otra vía de agua en el sistema bancario.

Aunque los detalles cambian, hay muchos más clientes que, contra pronóstico, están recuperando el dinero que dieron para promociones fantasma. Alec John Edwards es un técnico del servicio de bomberos de Liverpool que en 2009 dio 150.000 euros como anticipo por una casa en el Trampolin Hills, en un diminuto pueblo de Murcia: “Como vimos que no se construía pedimos ejecutar el aval, pero el banco se negaba”. Hace dos meses, tras un pleito, recobró los 150.000 euros, y aún no da crédito. Su abogada, Guadalupe Sánchez, opina que los británicos tienen más costumbre de pleitear: “A los españoles les cuesta más ir contra la banca. Los anglosajones lo tienen más interiorizado”. Antonio Flores, abogado de Málaga especializado en atender a clientes extranjeros en temas inmobiliarios, coincide: “Estos insistieron mucho más y exigieron una respuesta del sistema”.

Los jueces empiezan a paliar la mala fama del urbanismo español en Europa. El Supremo exigió en marzo pasado especial protección para los extranjeros que compren una vivienda. Keith resume: “España ha demostrado ser un país serio, en el que si perseveras, la justicia funciona”.

"Zahara de los Atunes10". Beach of the Bunker, Atlanterra, Zahara, Cadiz, Southernwest Spain, by Asier Llaguno, at flickr.com

http://elpais.com/elpais/2013/07/09/inenglish/1373371128_743177.html

The British buyers fight back

Foreign property investors are battling to recover money lost in deals gone bad

Rafael Méndez – El País English Edition - 9 JUL 2013 - 14:20 CET 

Keith Rule says that he first thought about buying a house in Spain after a friend told him about an advertisement he had seen in an easyJet in-flight magazine for a property development in Hellín, called Finca Parcs-Las Higuericas, in Albacete province. The year was 2006, the height of the country's property boom.

"It was being sold as 'the real Spain'," says Rule. The development was not on the coast, but inland, in a lovely place," explains Rule on the phone from the UK.

Finca Parcs-Las Higuericas was going to consist of 617 chalets with their own swimming pools. Few of the 300 or so British or Irish investors who put down a deposit knew the area, but the layout plans and artist's impressions looked good, the price was right... what could go wrong?

Spain's property market collapsed in early 2008, taking with it hopes that Finca Parcs-Las Higuericas would ever materialize. The company behind the project, Cleyton Ges, went bankrupt, and Keith Rule began to worry that he would never get back the 53,434 euros he had put down, much less get his Spanish vacation home. The bank that had acted as intermediary in the promotion, CAM, was in serious financial difficulties of its own: it was unable to finance the operation, and would not return the money it had taken. He contacted a lawyer, who told him to sue Cleyton Ges. "But I knew that this wouldn't get me my money back. I looked on the internet and using the little Spanish I have, discovered that there was a law from 1968 stating that the bank was also responsible."

Using my Spanish, I found a 1968 law saying that the bank was responsible"

The little-known legislation that Rule uncovered details procedures in the case of deposits put down on the construction and sale of dwellings, and outlines in clear terms the guarantees that a home buyer is entitled to. The preamble states that the law was passed in response to "the justified alarm among the public caused by repeated abuses, which on the one hand, are a threat to social stability, and on the other, are clear breaches of the law."

The law was designed to avoid the repetition of cases such as Nueva Esperanza, a property developer that took money from more than 10,000 savers without ever building a single home. "The measures we are taking are meant to resolve an indignant problem, because people that had spent a lifetime saving to buy an apartment saw their money disappear overnight, and were left with no home," said the then-housing minister, according to the newspaper Abc . The law not only required the property developer to return buyers' money, but required the bank to guarantee that any amounts it received were spent on construction. The bank would, from now on, have to supervise the money and provide a guarantee "under its own responsibility." In other words, if a bank takes your money as a deposit on a property, if that property is not built, it is responsible for returning your money.

When the property market collapsed, lawyer Javier Domínguez Romero was contacted by people who, like Keith Rule, were in danger of losing their deposits, and who had also looked at the 1968 law. "The law had been forgotten about for years during the economic boom. Few lawyers even knew about it," says Domínguez, who later published a book on the subject.

Around the same time, Keith Rule had begun looking for a Spanish lawyer who would handle his lawsuit, as well as those of 46 other would-be home owners. Eventually he met with Jaime de Castro, a Gibraltar-based lawyer used to representing British clients within the Spanish legal system. The trial was held in May 2012. CAM tried delaying tactics by saying that all those bringing charges must appear in person in court. All 47 made the trip to Albacete provincial court, although none of them were questioned by CAM's legal team. CAM's argument was simple. It had no "legal relationship" with the 47, and said they would have to pursue their case against the property developer. The bank did not have guarantees for each depositor, as it was required to do so by law, should there be any problem with the construction.

The judge hearing the case agreed that CAM was indeed responsible and ordered it to return the 1.5 million euros that the British had paid to the developer: "CAM knew that the deposits placed in accounts in its branches were from the buyers of a property development and completely abandoned its responsibilities to them under the 1968 legislation, and as such committed bad banking practices." The sentence has since been ratified, and the British investors are getting their money back, with interest and costs. CAM, which has been taken over by Banco Sabadell, has not appealed against the ruling. The bank says that it inherited the problem. The British embassy says that it will use the ruling for future cases.

Rule, who is now working with the legal team that won the case, says that the ruling should give hope to anybody who has lost money to a property developer. "This law, after 45 years, is more necessary than ever," he says. He has set a precedent that in general terms provides much greater protection to consumers, because the bank has to pay, even if there is no guarantee.

Similar cases have emerged in recent months of foreign investors getting their money back from bankrupt property developers. Alec Edwards works for the Liverpool fire brigade. In 2009, he put down 150,000 euros as a deposit on a property in Trampolin Hills, in Murcia. "We could see that there was no building work, so we asked the bank to execute the guarantee, which it refused to do." Two months ago, after bringing legal action, he got all of his money back. His lawyer, Guadalupe Sánchez, says that British people are more inclined to take legal action. "Spaniards do not like taking on the banks, but the British seem to have no fear," she explains. Antonio Flores, a Malaga-based lawyer who specializes in construction disputes involving non-Spaniards, agrees: "These people really put their foot down, and demanded a response from the system."

Spanish judges are at last beginning to do something to improve the country's poor reputation inEurope. In March, the Supreme Court demanded that foreigners buying here be given special protection. Rule says that he is happy, not just for himself: "Spain has shown that it is a serious country, and that if you insist, the justice system works."

Victory of our client Keith Rule at the Finca Parcs case.

Today´s article today at THE TIMES.

 

Spanish bank forced to pay back €1.5m deposit

Graham Keeley – Madrid – 10 July 2013

A British businessman has won a landmark legal victory against a Spanish bank that was refusing to return €1.5 million in deposits that he and other buyers had paid for 47 villas.

Keith Rule, 46, led a group of British and Irish people who had invested off plan in a luxury development near Murcia, southeastern Spain, marketed as the “real Spain”.

They paid their deposits in 2006 but when the property bubble burst in 2008 the developer collapsed, and the Spanish bank, Caja de Ahorros del Mediterráneo, refused to return their money.

Faced with losing €53,000 (£46,000) of his own money, Mr Rule researched a 1968 property law and used Google translator and a basic knowledge of Spanish to fight back. Spanish lawyers told him that he was unwise to take on a bank and would lose but he convinced one lawyer to take up his case.

When the case came to court, the bank demanded that all 47 buyers attend. Mr Rule organised their journey.

A judge sitting in Albacete ruled against the bank and ordered it to pay back €1.5 million in deposits to Mr Rule and the 46 other buyers.

The judge ruled that the bank was guilty of malpractice by failing to safeguard deposits. The same court dismissed an appeal by the bank, which must also pay costs and interest.

“This could have implications for many more British people who have bought properties in Spain but have lost out,” Mr Rule, who runs a laundry in Milton Keynes, said. “It proves that if you persevere then you can get justice in Spain but it is a bit of a lottery depending on whether you get the right judge.”

Caja de Ahorros del Mediterráneo, which was later taken over by Banco Sabadell, claimed that Mr Rule and other buyers were not entitled to their money back because they had no bank guarantees. It said the developer, Cleyton Ges SL, should have guaranteed the deposit money, not the bank. However, Mr Rule argued that the bank had a duty to guarantee deposits in case the developer went bust.

The case revolved around Finca Parcs, a luxury development of 617 villas. Today, seven years after hundreds of Britons were lured into spending millions on the home of their dreams, the development is a ghost town. Mr Rule has become a part-time adviser on the issue to a Spanish law firm. Another 53 buyers are still out of pocket and thousands more British expatriates in Spain face similar battles after the collapse of the property market.

Giles Paxman, the British Ambassador in Madrid, wrote to Mr Rule to congratulate him on his victory. A spokesman for the bank said that it would not appeal.

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/uk/article3812399.ece?CMP=OTH-gnws-standard-2013_07_09