Living abroad tips and hints for money savers

droopsnout

Thanks, gfp.

I will attempt similar manoeuvre when back in the UK in the New Year. Whether the Doncaster branch (or Manchester, Blackburn, or Kidderminster branches - wherever I end up!) will be as enlightened remains to be seen. I will, like you, report back.

sloan

Just getting into the third week of being here in North Cyprus. Still trying to get my head around the fact that I am not on holiday, but semi-resident. Weather still great, although did have some storms a week ago.

seven-day-weekend

Good news Sloan. The weather here has been hot and sunny. Wonderful....although it is chilly when the sun goes down. Had some heating for the first time last night.

Having been away five months, I keep thinking I am on holiday too!

sloan

Going back to England for a month for Christmas/New Year/60th birthday, and returning to Cyprus on January 11th. During our next trip to England, we have to fit in a week in Barcelona, one of the Ryanair cheap airfares, and a trip to Tel Aviv, a competition I won on the Easyjet facebook page.

Merrywidow

BUMP....BUMP...guess you are all envious of Sloan's plans. Have you checked out the cheap hotel offers on the MSE front page? Look great value.

sloan

Hey, yes. My daughter has managed to book us two Campanile rooms at £1 each for just before Christmas when we go over to Formby Hall to use our Lastminute.com Formby Hall Spa vouchers. I love this moneysavingexpert.com website!

mpython

Apologies for not having read all the posts, but maybe someone can point me in the right direction?

I've recently inherited a sizeable sum (circa £100k) and have always wanted a place in the sun. I've been looking around for a couple of weeks and found a couple of properties I would like to go and see (a rural one near Vera and one on a large estate in Mazarron).

I've budgeted for the purchase costs (7%IVA and 3%& legal and other taxes) and I won't buy if it doesn't feel right, but I want to find an english speaking lawyer to act on my behalf rather than one recomended by the estate agent or vender (in case they are in cahoots).

Does anyone have any personal recomendations re lawyers?

Also, any other feedback, general or specific, about the 2 localities or purchasing in Almeria or Murcia would be most welcome?

Thanks in advance.

seven-day-weekend

Hi and welcome to the forum.

My main recommendations would be not to buy off-plan, in fact do not buy a new build at all.

There is so much corruption in house building/buying in southern Spain, and Murcia and Almeria are two of the worst provinces (sorry). The houses are built, bought, then declared illegal and the poor homeowner has to foot the bill. Some properties have already been demolished leaving people homeless. No compensation.

Right, after that bit of doom and gloom, you're doing the right thing by getting an independent lawyer, for the reasons you stated. I also think you will be safer buying an older property in a town or village, rather than one on its own in the campo, it is far less likely to be illegal.

It's apparently a good idea to get a mortgage, even if you don't need one, as the property has far less chance of being illegal as it is verified by the bank (you could always pay the mortgage straight off !).

My other recommendation is, don't buy anything you can't see. For example, don't listen when the agent says 'yes of course you will be able to add an extension/ bring electricity to the property/ have a swimming pool'. Planning permission can be very hard to get and takes ages. So if the house doesn't have all the things you want (or at least room to put them, i.e a room already built that could be used as an extra bathroom), don't assume you will be able to add it at a later date.

Having said all that, you can have a great time in Spain, we've never regretted buying our little house in the mountains of Granada six years ago and the Spanish are great! (And our house is totally legal! )

Good luck and keep us posted!

LesD

mpython wrote: »

Apologies for not having read all the posts, but maybe someone can point me in the right direction?

I've recently inherited a sizeable sum (circa £100k) and have always wanted a place in the sun. I've been looking around for a couple of weeks and found a couple of properties I would like to go and see (a rural one near Vera and one on a large estate in Mazarron).

I've budgeted for the purchase costs (7%IVA and 3%& legal and other taxes) and I won't buy if it doesn't feel right, but I want to find an english speaking lawyer to act on my behalf rather than one recomended by the estate agent or vender (in case they are in cahoots).

Does anyone have any personal recomendations re lawyers?

Also, any other feedback, general or specific, about the 2 localities or purchasing in Almeria or Murcia would be most welcome?

Thanks in advance.

Hi Monty (hope you don't mind me being presumptuous!)

As someone with a casa on what I guess is your 'large estate in Mazarron', can I say there are many issues to be considered in addition to the legal ones.

Is it for a 'holiday home' or permanent residence? How is your Spanish? Do you want sand and sea, or hills and valleys? Are you a beer and skittles person or wine and tapas? Do you want access to good shopping or can you make do with the local market?

The one advantage of the 'large estate' is that it can support most alternatives. The big disadvantage, however, is that means there will be as many reasons NOT to go there as for its attractions. Also, the law of averages says there will be problems with some of the properties. These tend to get blown up to make it look as if all the properties are affected.

We did buy off plan, without a lawyer (!!!), and have never looked back. We have a full escritura publica (registered deeds) and a beautiful detached villa that would have cost much more if it was not part of the estate.

But there are problems around us. We do not have a Certificate of Habitation (licencia de primera ocupacion) as there are parts of the development that were not build in line with the approved plan. There are also some properties with unstable foundations. And the developer has not completed all the infrastructure as promoted in the marketing literature.

But we love it there!

If you want to discuss Mazarron offline, send me a Private Message.

sandy2_2

If you are thinking of buying in the countryside, there are also other things to consider: the prime ones for use were making sure there was mains water, mains electric and mains sewerage. secondary ones as you´re getting older does your country pile have easy access to shops, public transport, medical services, postal services, access to cash, is internet available. are there permanent neighbours just in case you ever need urgent hel`/advice, is there a signal available for your mobile, how will you cope/manage any land/trees/olives/oranges/vines, if the house does have land, what access do you have to irrigation water etc. If the house is old, how much will it cost to rewire, add insulation, efficient heating (yes it does get cold in the countryside in Spain in the winter). Does the country house actually have glass in the windows (may seem odd but friend of ours bought and found the house only had wooden shutters not glazed windows). If TV (english or spanish) can you get a signal or are the mountains blocking it? Can you get a landline pnone or satelite?
Having said all this, we live in a very small pueblo out in the countryside in Almeria and love it, having decided that we did not want land as it was too arduous to manage as we get older. We do not have some of the services I´ve mentioned which is OK at the moment as we are both healthy and can drive, but we also have an apartment in an urbanisation in a town which might evenyually become a retirement home

Sandy