Anyone appeared on Place in the sun?

PawelK

MEM62 said:

PawelK said:

Completely agree but wasn't really thinking about it as a permanent residence. Only either as a private holiday home to visit twice a year or so or with a potential of letting it out.

I have seen many go down this route and all regretted it.  Before you do anything look at the cost of rent in Spain.  They are cheap!  In the village where our relatives lived you could rent a three or four bedroom house for 400 EUR a month.  I absolutely could not understand why people were selling their houses in the UK and buying in Spain.  You also need to consider that buying is easy and selling is difficult so it is highly likely that you will be stuck with an asset that you cannot liquidate as and when you need to.  There is also the consideration that, by renting, you do not have to return to the same place.  If you get bored with a particular area you can move on or stay somewhere different on your next trip.  I cannot think of a single reason or benefit to committing yourself to property ownership in Spain.  

The single reason I can think of is to have a place which if profitable, provides an extra income. As always a risk but if letting permitted and running costs minimised it is achievable.

PawelK

Scotbot said:

PawelK said:

Browntoa said:

Holiday letting in Spain is starting to be heavily regulated in many regions . You may need to obtain a licence to do so , there was talk of communities having a veto on new letting without a 75% yes vote .

That will definitely narrow the areas where FHL investments are allowed but it doesn't have to be Spain. It could be Portugal, south of France or even Greece/Cyprus. Also, I am interested to see how the investors market will change after Brexit as already read in few places about older people going back to the UK and being replaced by younger ones.

It is not just Spain restricting holiday lets, this is becoming more common with the advent of Air BnB and other letting sites as holidaymakers can be noisy and a nuisance in residential blocks. You would need to check the restrictions in any development you looked at . 

Of course, all research must be done to ensure you can do it legally.

scottiescott

Everybody knows somebody who has done it. I know a few. Every one had problens of some kind; new neighbours tapping into your water supply, "trusted" locals whom you asked to clean the place between family and friends visits letting out your place on the fly, land property built on never designated for building ( required a bung to the local mayor to approve retrospectively) etc etc.
Not for me I'm afraid. I'd rather pay £5k a year for rentals for 20 years than purchase.

Slinky

The other disadvantage now of course for anybody without status to live in the EU is the limit of 90 days in any 180 days. I have friends who have a holiday home in Crete and voted for Brexit. Madness.

MEM62

PawelK said:

MEM62 said:

PawelK said:

Completely agree but wasn't really thinking about it as a permanent residence. Only either as a private holiday home to visit twice a year or so or with a potential of letting it out.

I have seen many go down this route and all regretted it.  Before you do anything look at the cost of rent in Spain.  They are cheap!  In the village where our relatives lived you could rent a three or four bedroom house for 400 EUR a month.  I absolutely could not understand why people were selling their houses in the UK and buying in Spain.  You also need to consider that buying is easy and selling is difficult so it is highly likely that you will be stuck with an asset that you cannot liquidate as and when you need to.  There is also the consideration that, by renting, you do not have to return to the same place.  If you get bored with a particular area you can move on or stay somewhere different on your next trip.  I cannot think of a single reason or benefit to committing yourself to property ownership in Spain.  

The single reason I can think of is to have a place which if profitable, provides an extra income. 

Highly unlikely with the cost of Spanish property and low rent yields in my opinion.    

PawelK

Friend of mine has a small and cheap studio in Algarve (more expensive than equivalent in Spain) and last year managed around 5-6% ROI not had while my savings are stuck in a max.1% accounts. 

NameUnavailable

Slinky said:

The other disadvantage now of course for anybody without status to live in the EU is the limit of 90 days in any 180 days. I have friends who have a holiday home in Crete and voted for Brexit. Madness.

Yes I know one or two like that and remember a reporter on TV asking expats in Spain what they thought of Brexit.

They didn't stop to think that they were immigrants too. Love it that they are now getting a reality check.

PawelK

NameUnavailable said:

Slinky said:

The other disadvantage now of course for anybody without status to live in the EU is the limit of 90 days in any 180 days. I have friends who have a holiday home in Crete and voted for Brexit. Madness.

Yes I know one or two like that and remember a reporter on TV asking expats in Spain what they thought of Brexit.

They didn't stop to think that they were immigrants too. Love it that they are now getting a reality check.

What an irony, isn't it? And sadly, I am getting to the point of not seeing much of my future here anymore and taking advantage of going to Europe where I'll feel more at home. 

greensalad

Slinky said:

We used to dream of having our own holiday home. In fact we have a budget line in our savings dedicated to it. However we decided that for the few weeks a year we'd be able to spend there it would be a very expensive way to have a holiday. We wouldn't want to let it out to strangers, so there would be only expense, no income. Plus we weren't sure we would always want to holiday in the same place, so if you go elsewhere, it gets even more expensive unless you then start holiday home swapping with others.

Much cheaper to rent somebody else's holiday home or hotel and have a world of choice of places to go.

I do love A Place in the Sun though, but I use it to research places to visit (or not!) for a holiday.

As a counter point to this, I love "our" family holiday home. I say our, it belongs to my Grandparents. It's on the Costa Blanca and is quite a modest house, not particularly glamorous but works for us. 

Of course it costs my Grandparents money but it was their dream to have something like that not just for themselves but for our family. They don't rent it out beyond people we know which works quite well. E.g some of my friends have gone out there for a week even though they don't know my Grandparents but they have my recommendation. They charge a nominal fee to cover the ground rent and utilities while they're out there, it's still a quarter of the price of what they would get on the market so generally everyone is happy. 

As for going to the same place every year I think this depends on how you like to travel and how many holidays you take. I admit my partner and I have regularly gone on 4 holidays a year (two holidays a week long and maybe two other city breaks) so we don't really feel like we're missing out. There are advantages to going to the same place every year just like there are disadvantages. We love that we know the area, we love that we get to do different things each time by venturing further out. We love the familiarity if we just want an easy holiday where we don't have to worry about whether the pool will be nice or the town will be OK. Now that we're getting along to have friends with kids it's worked really well for them to come on holiday with us because we know the environment is right for children if that makes sense. 

Overall, while I know I am not really the one paying for it so I probably don't have much say, it's a really lovely thing to have!