Property

rubencito wrote:

"only 5% of the properties we have seen have been legal" !!!   Where were you looking for a home?

Annemarie

It doesn't seem to matter where we are looking, it's all the same. The overwhelming majority of houses are to one degree or another not todo legal and the sellers don't seem to care or have any interest in registering their properties correctly once this is discovered.

Subalu, we have looked in the Moralet area and this is by far one of the worse areas for properties which are not registered correctly. It's a shame really as it's a nice area. In an ideal world it shouldn't be much hassle to make the changes yourself but trying to get illegally built structures or pools on rustic land can turn out to be a costly and lengthy process.

Mind you some people can live with all that, it's up to them to decide.

Even houses that have looked good initially on the catastro turn out to not match what is on the nota simple.
The one house that is completely legal and perfect is in an area in which future development will drastically change the surroundings and the urbanizacion is in a constant battle with the town hall over various squabbles, unfair taxes and recently has even lead to the mail delivery being stopped to people homes(pending).

None of these things are easily discovered either, hopefully you have been in contact with your lawyer by now because without one it is too easy to rush into a real headache.

Brighton105 wrote:

Nothing seems to have changed then I lived and work some years ago in Southern Spain. You would have thought by the E u laws would have sorted this mess out .I have been looking for a property on the internet and spoken to several agents , a bit dubious about one who says are based in Spain but I get a uk phone number? Once the agent realized I knew this and that I was Spain savvy heard no More ,anyone out there put me in touch with someone in Alicanti bonafide before we change our minds .

Forget about the agents, just use them as a tool to view which property you want to see when you come over and do your research first before seeing any property. Don't let them drag you around showing you houses you can't do a thing to.

Best advice is know what you are looking for first, scour the rental sites like idealista and fotocasa and create a list.
Do you want a house on urban or rustic land?
Bearing in mind that to be able to do anything meaningful on rustic land in this region you need to have 10,000msq of land first. Most don't have that much and therefor most are blocked for development by town halls.

Do some basic online checks of the property before visiting, first you need to locate the property but then it's easy by using a site like goolzoom to check the catastro and that will tell you just what type of land the house is on and it will also show you just how much of the house, pool and outbuildings have been correctly registered to pay tax.
It's not a complete way of checking but it sure beats spending a day visiting houses on rustic land that are illegal.
If you do decide to proceed on a property then always use a lawyer who is independent from the agent.

Brighton105 wrote:

Thanks for you advise , just what I was thinking all I keep getting from agents is whe are you coming over . I say when you send me some property details!! They don't seem to want to do that .
Wonder why?

Honestly pretty much all the details are already online, whenever you view a property and they give you the little folder full of info it is just a print out of what is on their website.
Any more info like bills, nota simple etc... normally come after you have visited the property and take a further interest in it.