House Exchange (Spain-UK)

star68

Hello everyone!
I have a beautiful villa 10 minute walk to the beach, in the province of Alicante the best climate in Spain 33 degrees in the sun yesterday, amazing weather, and I am desperate to swap with a house in the UK London or south-east preferably Brighton, my daughter is starting University studies in September and I haven't got much time to sale the property. If somebody could advise me about the best way to advertise it, I have look for house exchange websites but they are always asking for money at front and I don't think they are that good.
Any ideas? I am sure there are people willing to move to Spain in the Uk, even for investment purposes, but how can I find them?
Any advice will be welcome.

tim123456789

Hm,

I think that you need a huge amount of wishful thinking.

Given the current housing situation in Spain I suspect that anyone who wants to own there has choices coming out of their ears.

The chances of you finding someone who likes your house the best, who also wants to swap, is going to be slim.

I just put it up for sale the normal way, and accept that you're going to have to pay EA fees.

hazyjo

The chances of finding someone who'd want to swap with you have got to be about zero to slim, surely.

I would consider advertising in a local Brighton paper - give concise detailed info and say what you're looking for concisely too.

Am unaware of any other route.

Would imagine it would take far less time to sell conventionally than to look for someone who's looking for exactly what you're selling, with an exact property you're looking to buy!

Jx

star68

I still don't understand why some people think chances to swap are slim. Spain has gained negative reputation in the last years, but I still think is one of the best countries to live. The weather is excellent, crime is low, national health at least in my area is very good (short waiting list for operations, and GP's appointments are given same, following day the latest). Food is cheap, and cost of living low. Is an ideal place for pensioners or people who don't have to work to survive mainly because you need to speak the language. Ex-pats that live over here are very happy and they would never contemplate to go back to the UK. The ones that have gone back are because of financial problems, other ways they would have chosen to live here. I would love the media to do a documentary about my area it's a wonderful place to live and surely people would change their views about Spain.

rich11

Alicante is a large area.Can you narrow it down a bit?

tim123456789

star68 wrote: »

I still don't understand why some people think chances to swap are slim.

For the reasons stated.

It's got to be a (small) subset of the people looking to buy, and if there are people looking to buy your property why are you restricting youself to just those that want to swap?

p00hsticks

star68 wrote: »

I still don't understand why some people think chances to swap are slim. Spain has gained negative reputation in the last years, but I still think is one of the best countries to live. The weather is excellent, crime is low, national health at least in my area is very good (short waiting list for operations, and GP's appointments are given same, following day the latest). Food is cheap, and cost of living low. Is an ideal place for pensioners or people who don't have to work to survive mainly because you need to speak the language. Ex-pats that live over here are very happy and they would never contemplate to go back to the UK. The ones that have gone back are because of financial problems, other ways they would have chosen to live here. I would love the media to do a documentary about my area it's a wonderful place to live and surely people would change their views about Spain.

Even if I know nothing else about the situation, the fact that you are 'desperate to swap' and apparently unable to simply sell your property in spain through orthodox channels in order to buy a comparable property in the UK suggests that all is not as rosy as you paint it....

southoftheriver

Plus is the price of your property comparable to a place in some of the most popular areas in England? I'm guessing someone in these areas would be able to sell their properties fairly easily giving them more choice if they did want to buy abroad.

Is there a particular reason you want to swap rather than sell?

seven-day-weekend

star68 wrote: »

Hello everyone!
I have a beautiful villa 10 minute walk to the beach, in the province of Alicante the best climate in Spain 33 degrees in the sun yesterday, amazing weather, and I am desperate to swap with a house in the UK London or south-east preferably Brighton, my daughter is starting University studies in September and I haven't got much time to sale the property. If somebody could advise me about the best way to advertise it, I have look for house exchange websites but they are always asking for money at front and I don't think they are that good.
Any ideas? I am sure there are people willing to move to Spain in the Uk, even for investment purposes, but how can I find them?
Any advice will be welcome.

Even if you manage to exchange you will still need to pay the usual taxes in Spain, based on their valuation of your property.

However, we did sell ours without an agent. We priced realistically, made up our own brochure and put English and Spanish copies of it in places where people went, such as bars and cafes. We only had one serious viewing but luckily the people bought it. We also took a 20% hit on the (realistic) asking price.

We also put it on a few free internet sites but got no response whatsoever from any of these.

Good luck!

star68

OK. My property is in the area of Mil Palmeras (Pilar de la Horadada)
South of Alicante. The reason why I am interested in a permanent exchange or swap is because I haven't got much time to sell the property, the property will sell eventually but is just recently that my daughter has been offered a place at Brighton University and I only got until April-May to sell and start the move because she starts in September. I have put the property with local state agents, they charge a huge amount in commission that's why I rather sell it privately, me being Spanish I can organize all the paperwork and both parties can save a lot of money. To sell the property privately in England is difficult. I have asked a lots of state agents in UK but they don't sell properties abroad. So my only option is to advertise in websites to increase my chances.
The brochure idea is very good but I am in Spain so it will be difficult.

hazyjo

Could she just rent in Brighton? Surely it makes a lot more sense than your proposal...

(btw, it's estate agent, not state)

With the language barrier, I think it would absolute hell on earth to deal with a swap. Solicitors would have to liaise with each other, surely. I would just sell in Spain, with a Spanish agent (it's expensive in the UK too), and rent in Brighton for a while, rather than trying to combine the two transactions.

Jx