How it all started
Saturday, May 31, 2008 @ 3:35 PM
As so many Brits do, we (Sam and I plus her parants) wanted to move from the cold and wet, the traffic congestion and long hours at work to start a new life in Spain. We started looking at different business ideas and came across a franchise opportunity at OPI Rentals who are the largest property management and rental company in Spain. After coming over to the Costa Blanca and after a few meetings with the directors, we decided to open up an office in La Marina in August 2006. We chose this area as soon as we saw the beaches (they stretch for miles with pine forrests, sand dunes and are blue flag award winners). Our thoughts were if we loved the beaches then it must be popular for tourists and it would be a lovely palce to live. Of course there were other reasons, there are other popular resorts close by such as Guardamar, Torrevieja, Alicante and Benidorm, numerous golf courses, one of the largest shopping complexes in Europe at Murcia (40 minute drive) and Alicante airport is only a 20 minute drive. La Marina itself is a large urbanizacion with plenty of supermarkets, shops, bars and restaurants and even a couple of nightclubs. With so much work opportunities in the area there had to be a demand for rental properties for long term lets as well as holidays.
Well looking back we were a little nieve as we had no experience in this field and couldnt imagine how much time it would take up. However in less then 2 years w have established ourselfs and are building a good reputation plus the OPI group are growing with more and more offices opening throughout Spain. As any property manager will tell you it is not easy work, with so many things that can go wrong in a property from no electric at 06.00, losing satellite reception before the big game is just about to start or damp problems in the winter. But as soon as the weekend arrives and you go down to them lovely beaches, you realise it is all worth it.