And came across a Spanish property site. Sorta, Zoopla for Spain.
https://www.idealista.com/
Armfuls of places at €20k. Houses of some size at €40k. Some of which aren’t ruins but look habitable. OK, this is Huelva province, by the Algarve border.
But what else is it I’m missing. Are these prices plus take on a mortgage? Or is this what property costs in some parts of Spain?
And are there nice parts where this is still true?
Bloke? What’s it like your way? No, not sheds in the wilds, but townhouses/big flats even if around a backstreet somewhere?
We thought we were relocating temporarily from Normandy to Barcelona (for employment reasons) with the expectation of frequent long weekends in Normandy. [Plus months in Texas]
So we signed up to idealista and got heaps of property emails from them.
It **seems** to us that the best way of using the service – which is pretty good – is to use it as a means of finding stuff that looks attractive. Experience suggests that it’s best to have direct contact with the listing agent, and use them to look around the area. We had little luck using the contact the advertiser service direct from the website.
So give it a whack. It’s fun drawing on a map to show where you’re interested 🙂
Be lucky to get a garage space in an out-of-centre area (but not slummy area) in Bilbao for €20,000.
They will likely have squatters in at that price, assuming no latent structural defect or massive service charge.
Huelva? Near Portugal. About all that’s going for it, really. If you like Portugal, that is.
I had a look round in this province. There’s a place going up in the Mountains of Malaga, caught my eye. 40k Basically a ruin with a bit of ground. Cadestral says it’s rated as industrial. One could probably get change of use. It may already have electric. There’s something looks like a pole in the photo. Water’d be the question. Might only be agricultural. Although we had agricultural in the Sierra Nevadas. Lanharon water basically. You’ll pay 5€ a bottle for that in a restaurant.
Flats. There’s a 3 bed going in Malaga City. 84m3. 6th floor with lift. 37,300€ I’d say the block might be 70s. But it’s near La Roca health centre ( where the putas go for check ups) If it’s where I think it is it’s in a Malaga war zone. Lot of Gitanos, Marruecos & some other of Africa’s finest. About as dangerous as any London postcode but safer than most.
Should have added. It’s going 100% totally free of Brits. Virtually paradise.
… and then you have to live in it.
There are places in southern Italy for €1. Nobody wants to live there – too far from jobs, too few public services. I assume these cheap places in Spain are the same?
@AndrewM
I think there’s a very different attitude to buildings in much of Europe, compared to the UK. They’re built for a purpose. When the purpose no longer applies, they stop using them. They let them fall down. The value’s in the function not the fabric. Seen it in France, as well as here. They lived in that house because it was convenient for what they were doing when transport was more problematic. Since cars, travel’s easier so why life in that isolated house on a hill when you can have a nice apartment with aircon, close to the shops & bar? Or why try to renovate an old building, simply because it’s old, when building a new one is more cost effective.? The only reason they’re on the market is there’s idiot Brits about who might want to buy them.
It’s going 100% totally free of Brits. Virtually paradise.
It’s possible, Tim, that bloke in spain just isn’t going to tell a Brit about the really nice places.
bloke in spain,
“Or why try to renovate an old building, simply because it’s old, when building a new one is more cost effective.? The only reason they’re on the market is there’s idiot Brits about who might want to buy them.”
Brits are obsessed with old buildings. I’ve never get it. I mean there’s some amazing historic buildings, but living in them is shit compared to modern ones.
Planning permission system makes it impossible to do anything with your own property. Smart buggers across the sea didn’t make the same mistake.
@BoM4
I spent a couple years wandering around Western France helping people renovate old houses they’d bought. For nothing too. For fun. Can’t say I saw anything I’d want to live in. Hard to heat. The charms of splitting & humping logs for wood burning stoves soon go stale in driving freezing rain. So do 90km round trip shopping expeditions because those charming shops in that picturesque village charge you an arm & leg. Did buy a house in Brittany from a Brit couple for about half what they’d paid for it. They’d done some painting & put in a kitchen of sorts. But hadn’t actually got around to replacing half the roof or putting in the Fosse (septic tank) it needed if you didn’t want to be using an earth privvy. Because the place didn’t come with enough ground to put one. Fixed the roof, put in a rather clever device substituted for the fosse (after getting it cleared with local building control). Flogged to some Dutch for a 300% profit & scarpered. You could get around the fact it was in the arse end of nowhere. Sort of place the French are pleased to leave, not go to.