Justin's Life

OK guys, please be gentle here!  I thought it would be interesting to try out some video blogging!  My little fingers get very tired tapping away on the keyboard all day long so I thought I'd record a video from my web cam instead!

When I do these they will be just one take, so if they come out crap it's because I'm recording directly in YouTube and can't edit them.  It's the only way to do this quickly.

Anyway, I thought I'd kick this off with a video about Halloween in Spain.

 If you're interested, have a read of this Halloween in Spain article we published back in 2008.

I remember that four years ago we received an email from someone who had her property listed for sale here on Eye on Spain.  She had just been conned out of €6,000.

She had received an enquiry from someone in Nigeria who was really keen to buy here property.  He'd then given her some story about laptops in Holland (alarm bells?) and to cut a long story short, she's "leant" him €6,000 on the promise that he would buy the property.

Obviously he had no intention of buying anything and as a result she lost her money and still had to sell her property.

To say I was rather distressed by this news is an understatement.

So, we implemented some measures to try to prevent this happening again.

We decided that we would review all enquiries before sending them to the owners.  We would check them every day to ensure that they were as legit as possible. Generally these fraudsters are quite easy to spot by us and they tend to contact many owners at the same time.

Some still get through our system so we always advise owners to be careful in how they handle their enquiries.

Today I nearly missed one.  Take a look:

For a second I was about to hit the "Send to owner" button, especially as this person had only enquiried on one property.

Luckily I realised in time that this is one of those Nigerian fraudsters at work again.  How do I know?

• They always use yahoo.com email addresses
• The phone number is either a Nigerian number or a fake (as above)
• The English is poor, it generally reads like it's from another era
• They use odd English names
• They tend to say they are respresenting someone else

So, if something does slip through our system and you're unsure about the trust factor of an enquiry, then please get in touch with us as we can quite quickly confirm if it is a fraudster or not.

The other thing to note, and this applies to rentals as well as properties for sale, is that YOU SHOULD NEVER PART WITH ANY MONEY.  If you are selling your property or renting it out then they are supposed to give you money, not the other way around.

I really don't want to be receiving any more distressing emails!  We do our best but we're not perfect so please just be careful.

I see this on the Spanish news today and just had to share it.  These pandas were recently born in Madrid and they've just been shown off for the first time.

These pandas are just too cute!

I sent out this email yesterday to those who get the newsletter, but if you don't then check this out:

I've recorded an excellent video for you today which will be of particular interest to those either already living in Spain or planning the "dream" move.


http://www.eyeonspain.com/ebooks/bootstrapping/


The video shows you how I made some money online this week in just 24 hours with no website, no domain name, no money,  nothing....just my time, actually only 15 minutes of my time.

It's very real and I've recorded it because two good friends of mine, Nick Snelling and Graham Hunt have just released an ebook on making a living in Spain.

It's such a big topic at the moment as there really are no jobs over here and many expats are leaving every day because they just
can't make ends meet.

Watch the video to see what all the fuss is about and how a little bit of effort online may be the answer:


http://www.eyeonspain.com/ebooks/bootstrapping/


I hope you find it of interest.
 

On our street there are 12 houses and some apartments opposite us.  It's generally a very quiet street which is just how I like it.

However, every now and then we do get some "issues" which keep me awake half the night.

Last night is one case in point, which is why I feel like death warmed up today.

I was working at home trying to clear a huge backlog of emails so didn't get to bed until about 2am.  It was a bit warm so opened the bedroom window a little.

By the time I fell asleep it was about 2:30am....only to be woken up again just half an hour later.

The local drunk (he is very well known) was having an argument with himself on our street.  He's obviously quite irate shouting at himself quite a bit, and occassionally laughing at himself too.

Anyway, I was annoyed with all this noise outside but I thought he'd soon get bored and move on.   But he didn't he appeared to be quite happy on our street.  I closed the window but he was still resonating in my bedrom.

Now, normally with these sorts of issues the local police are very good at dealing with them (I have them on speed-dial on my phone!!).  But I didn't really want to call the police.  So I waited until someone else on the street told him to move on.

But no one did!  After about half an hour of non-sleep I went downstairs, opened the front door and told him to sling it!  He did oblige although he left me his large empty Cruzcampo bottle as a present.

But what gets me is why does no one else on the street ever seem to be bothered by these sorts of things?  Has everyone fitted sound-proofing in the bedrooms??  Our neighbour is actually one of the local policemen, does it not bother him or his wife?

It seems it's always me that's moaning.  No one else seems bothered by anything.  I am the local moaner.

I think I have become the Victor Meldrew of Manilva.

"I don't belieeeeeevvvvveeeee iiiiiitttttttt"