Buying a place

We moved to Spain August 2019 and since then have been thru 4 rented properties 3 apartment style and most recently a house.

Firstly the company provided us with an apartment in centre of Marbella, we moved out of that to an apartment in the very top of Los Naranjos which turned out to be a bit of a disaster as the day we moved in they had a water leak which whilst fixed the work required on the apartment meant we couldn't live in it, so that was two places in 3 months.

We then moved to San Pedro de Alcantara where we have stayed for essentially three years, firstly in a three bedroom ground floor apartment and then a lovely five bedroom villa with its own as opposed to shared pool (as much as I love and so does our dog like a private pool, be aware you have to maintain it). This was definitely a better place to be than the Los Naranjos place would have been during lockdown, to be honest had we been in Los Naranjos I'm not sure we'd still be in Spain.

Whilst the postal address might be San Pedro it is also referred to as Nueva Alcantara.

We've been really happy and love San Pedro, often described as "Spanish town" which is just fine by us as it is essentially a mixture of nationalities Spanish, English, Swedish, French, German, Ukrainian, Russian and many many more. It makes for a great mix especially of food! Plus you have to speak Spanish unlike some areas of the eastern side of Marbella where literally it is like little England and whilst I'm sure that attracts some people, why move to another country to re-create where you came from?

Then just before this summer the lady we were renting from announced that she wanted to sell the house and ideally wanted to sell it to us, sadly the asking price was somewhat over our budget. So we started down the road of looking. It became clear very quickly that actually renting was crazier than it was when we first started and if we could make it work then buying was the right answer. So to cut a long story short we did the maths and found that even with all the extra costs of owning we'd still be paying out 1000€/month less than if we were renting, plus we had an appreciating asset.

So the process of buying a place in Spain began. Finding what we wanted at the right price point, even if we renovated proved essentially impossible in San Pedro, so we had to look in the surrounding areas and after many visits we settled on a place in Nueva Andalucia, although in reality it is almost Puerto Banus. A 4 bedroom, 3 bathroom duplex apartment on an urbanisation only 15 minutes walk from the beach. A far cry from the first place we had in Los Naranjos which was up the top of the hill and about an hour from the beach!

The goto website where most people start is idealista but bear in mind stuff on here is changing all the time and a walk round local estate agents is often as valuable, the trick is find a property agent you can work with and get them to do the leg work, but don't be afraid to shop around.

The geographic boundaries of these areas is somewhat confusing hopefully this picture explains it, although where we lived in Los Naranjos is often regarded as Nueva Andalucia as sometimes is Puerto Banus.

So now you have to figure out how to avoid all the horror stories that you hear about of buying in Spain, the reality on our experience I would say is they are very very few and far between and bite you if you take short cuts.

We were fortunate to have some good friends one of whom works for a law firm in Marbella and one manages properties so we had plenty of good advice to tap into. We also needed to get a mortgage and worked with our bank (Sabadell) on that they did a great job. Worth bearing in mind that as a Spanish resident the most you can have is an 80% mortgage, as a non-resident 90%, plus you need to bank on not just your deposit but other costs of approximately 10% (varies depending on where you live in Spain). Your bank will ask you to provide bank statements and credit checks for every country you have an account in plus proof of the deposit and fees. In addition your lawyer will ask you for proof of source of wealth i.e. where are you funding your deposit and fees from. This is an AML (Anti Money Laundering) requirement.

Also worth remembering post BREXIT as a UK passport holder, but not Spanish resident you have some additional third country national hurdles to jump over (BREXIT, the gift that keeps on giving and for the record before any BREXITERS complain about these rules, they existed already the EU didn't inflict them on the UK, the UK inflicted them on itself and actually helped write them).

Outside of that I'd expect your lawyer to be working with the vendor on obtaining a bunch of supporting documentation, which definitely includes as a minimum:

1. Acquisition title and “nota simple”
2. First occupancy license (Licencia de primera ocupación)
3. Non infraction certificate
4. Energy efficiency certificate
5. Copies of Supplies invoices
6. Latest IBI and basura receipts
7. Touristic license (if available)
8. Information about the community of owners (if applicable):
• By laws
• Any other internal rules or regulations
• Last 2 minutes of community meetings
• If there is any extraordinary contribution approved
• If there is any resolution imposing any restrictions or prohibition to the tourist rentals
• Amount of the periodical quotas

If you get all of this stuff then in our experience you are OK.

Your bank of course will want to do a survey which will detail a lot of this stuff as well (in our experience this is a 20 page document) plus of course the valuation for mortgage purposes.

Then you should expect to spend time at the notary and the bank signing documents (some of this they will accept scanned and signed copies), but things like acceptance of the mortgage offer (known as FEIN), the private sale document and the final transaction public sale document on the day of completion have to be signed at the notary.

The process like the UK one is a two stage contractual process there is the private sale part, consider it like exchange of contracts, basically pays the vendor some form of deposit (typically 10%) at which point they take it off the market. Once all of the above paperwork has been done then you goto the public sale document at the notary and the property is yours.

You'll have to contact water, electric and internet providers to move over services as well as if you are buying in a community the "management body" to arrange payment of your community fees, equally you'll have to talk to your local municipality to sort out paying IBI and basura, you can put all of these on direct debit.

 

Also worth a note the day of the final signing the bank debit the mortgage amount from you chosen repayment account before they write the cheque, a bit strange because for a period of time you end up several 100K overdrawn, but this is all part of the process as you sign the final mortgage document after the public sale. Once the mortgage document is signed the negative balance goes away and life returns to normal.

You'll also need to pay the sales tax a few days after completion and the notarised documents will need to goto the land registry.

You can of course grant your lawyer Power of Attorney to sign stuff for you with the notary.

One last thought bear in mind Spanish inheritance laws (like French) are different to those of you familiar with UK ones, things to do not automatically pass between spouses it goes to children first, so you need to invest in a Will that clearly lays out your wishes, get some proper legal advice.

This is all from our experience which was generally hassle free and I'm sure I've missed something (aka the disclaimer), now comes the actual moving and getting sorted part.

If you are in the Marbella area I can recommend a good legal firm they are linked from my blog but also included here https://marbellapropertylawyers.home.blog/ this covers more than buying a property and is a good read.