July 2013

Hello again. This month I would like to tell you a short story. It is a story that you have undoubtedly heard before but it is no less worth telling for that.

In 2001 a Danish couple, Mr and Mrs Petersen, decided to retire to Spain and bought an old finca on a hillside north of Amuñecar. They hired a local lawyer and a local architect to help them rebuild the property. They applied for a building permit, were given permission and sent a bill for the permit from the Ayuntamiento which they paid. Nobody said anything was wrong.

The house was built and in 2003 they retired and moved to Spain to enjoy the climate, the culture and the people.

Now, as you well know, this is the part of the story where things become complicated. It turns out that the Ayuntamiento had not given them formal permission. It also turns out that they didn’t inform the Petersens of this or told them why the application was rejected.

When they tried to get the documentation together they couldn’t but were advised that after 4 years there would not be a problem. Then in 2009 they were advised that if they made the house a little smaller and paid another 13,000€ then everything would be sorted. It wasn’t.

In 2011 Mrs Petersen died of breast cancer leaving her husband to continue the struggle alone.

Late last year Mr Petersen was ordered by the Ayuntamiento to demolish his house and pay a fine of 11,500€ each month until it is done. Now his family are talking to us at SOHA.ES.

Sure they made mistakes, when they chose the architect, the lawyer, the town and for sure the country to retire in and for those mistakes they have paid very heavily indeed.

I received this bitterly sad tale in my inbox this month at the same time as we received a response to a letter we sent to the Ministry of Public Works in Madrid asking them to intervene in the problems of Andalucia.

As the Ministry washed their hands of Andalucia one line of the letter stood out. “Spain offers investors and property owners a framework of protection, fully comparable, if not more demanding, than any of the countries of the European Union”.

I’m pretty sure Mr Petersen disagrees.