[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":344},["ShallowReactive",2],{"content:cities:en":3,"content:pseo:pisos-en-venta:villajoyosa:en":42,"content:services:en":80,"content:lexikon:en":343},[4,17,29],{"slug":5,"name":6,"state":7,"facts":8},"benidorm","Benidorm","Costa Blanca, Spain",[9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16],"The city is built around two urban beaches, Levante and Poniente, separated by the rock of the old castle; the viewpoint on top of it is the Balcón del Mediterráneo, and the old town occupies the isthmus between the two bays.","The vertical skyline is a planning decision rather than an accident: the plan approved in the middle of the twentieth century chose tall buildings with open ground between them instead of closed city blocks, which is why the seafront is a line of towers.","Buyers here read the city by district before they read square metres: Levante and Rincón de Loix to the north-east, the old town in the centre, Poniente to the south-west, inland neighbourhoods such as Salto del Agua, and the western edge where the built-up area continues into the separate municipality of Finestrat.","Tourism runs all twelve months, with a winter season of residents from northern Europe, so shops, the urban buses and medical services stay open outside the summer — which is not true of every town on this coast.","Services in English, German and Dutch are normal rather than exceptional here — doctors, banks, trades, bars — which is the practical reason many foreign buyers start their search in this city rather than in the smaller towns around it.","The TRAM narrow-gauge tram has its terminus in the city, linking Alicante in one direction and the Marina Alta and Dénia in the other. The AP-7 motorway and the N-332 coast road give road access, and Alicante-Elche airport is a little under an hour away.","The housing stock mixes buildings from the nineteen-sixties and seventies with recent schemes, so buying here means looking at the age of the building, the state of the communal installations and any approved derrama — a levy voted for works — before looking at the view from the terrace.","A large part of that stock is used only a few months a year, and it shows in the owners' associations: tight budgets, poorly attended meetings and repair decisions that drag on. The minutes of the last meeting say more about a building than its advert does.",{"slug":18,"name":19,"state":7,"facts":20},"villajoyosa","Villajoyosa",[21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28],"Villajoyosa and la Vila Joiosa are the same town: the second is its name in Valencian, and both appear in official documents, so a buyer will meet either spelling. It belongs to the Marina Baixa comarca in the province of Alicante, and its centre lies about eight kilometres along the coast from Benidorm.","The fishing port is still working and the lonja still auctions the day's catch, which is why the town's economy does not rest entirely on the summer season.","Chocolate has been made here industrially since the nineteenth century: the Valor factory and its museum are in the town, and cocoa sits alongside fishing, retail and construction in the local economy.","The painted houses along the old seafront are the image the town is known by; tradition holds that each fisherman painted his own so he could recognise it from the sea. The quarter is a protected ensemble, so façade, joinery, roof and colour are conditioned by the town hall — which changes the budget and the timetable of any renovation there.","The Roman past is visible: the Torre de Sant Josep, a funerary monument, stands just outside the centre, and the municipal museum displays the finds from the Roman town the modern one sits on.","The TRAM tram stops in the town: one direction leads to Benidorm, the other to Alicante. The N-332 runs through the municipality, the A-7 and AP-7 give access inland, and Alicante-Elche airport is around forty kilometres away.","Hospital Marina Baixa, the public referral hospital for the whole comarca, is inside this municipality — a detail that weighs for anyone buying to live here all year rather than in August.","For a buyer the practical difference from Benidorm is scale: the seafront is not vertical, the buildings are lower and new construction is far scarcer, so each individual scheme counts for more in the decision and comparable sales are harder to find.",{"slug":30,"name":31,"state":32,"facts":33},"alicante","Alicante","Province of Alicante, Spain",[34,35,36,37,38,39,40,41],"Alicante, Alacant in Valencian, is the capital of the province of the same name and the seat of its Diputación and of the provincial offices of the state administration, so a good part of the comarca's formalities end up passing through the city.","Santa Bárbara castle crowns Mount Benacantil in the middle of the city; at its foot lie the old town and the Santa Cruz quarter, narrow streets with almost no vacant plots left, where what moves is refurbishment rather than new building.","The port sits directly against the city centre and combines freight, cruise calls and regular passenger lines; the Explanada promenade and the Postiguet beach district lean straight onto it.","Alicante-Elche Miguel Hernández airport is in the neighbouring municipality of Elche, about ten kilometres from the centre, and it is the air gateway for the whole Costa Blanca, including Benidorm and Villajoyosa.","The city hosts the European Union Intellectual Property Office, and the main campus of the University of Alicante is immediately to the north in San Vicente del Raspeig; both sustain a demand for housing that does not depend on the tourist season.","Alicante Terminal station has high-speed services to Madrid and local services towards the south of the province and Murcia, and the TRAM along the coast to Benidorm leaves from the city centre.","New construction concentrates in the northern extensions and around Playa de San Juan, several kilometres from the centre and linked to it by tram, while in the consolidated districts the activity is replacement and renovation of existing buildings.","For a buyer, Alicante is the least seasonal market in the province: there is demand for primary homes all year, which is why its districts are compared on schools, transport, parking and services before they are compared on distance to the beach.",{"service":43,"city":18,"title":44,"metaTitle":45,"metaDescription":46,"h1":47,"sections":48,"faq":67},"pisos-en-venta","Villajoyosa or Benidorm, for a buyer","Villajoyosa or Benidorm: choosing between the two","Villajoyosa or Benidorm: what separates a working fishing town from a vertical resort city eight kilometres away, and what each choice means for a buyer.","Villajoyosa or Benidorm: how the two towns differ and what that means if you are choosing",[49,52,55,58,61,64],{"heading":50,"text":51},"Eight kilometres apart, and two different purchases","Most people looking at flats in Villajoyosa arrive after looking at Benidorm, eight kilometres down the coast road. The two are neighbours and they are not alternatives of the same kind. This page compares them for a buyer: the buildings, the year, the transport, and what you will not find here.\n\nLa Vila Joiosa, its name in Valencian, is the traditional capital of the Marina Baixa comarca in the province of Alicante. It is not a suburb of Benidorm and not a coastal development: it is a town with a historic centre, a working fishing port, industry of its own and the comarca's hospital. Nearly everything else follows from that.",{"heading":53,"text":54},"One town is vertical by design, the other is not","Benidorm's skyline is a planning decision, not an accident: the town's mid-century plan chose tall buildings with open ground between them instead of closed city blocks, and the towers on the seafront are the result. Villajoyosa was never rezoned that way. Its seafront is low, its centre is a dense old quarter above the beach, and new schemes appear on single plots rather than in whole districts.\n\nFor a foreign buyer that difference is practical rather than aesthetic. In Benidorm there are hundreds of broadly comparable flats in towers of similar age, so a price can be sanity-checked against neighbours on the same street. Here there are far fewer directly comparable homes, which makes a single valuation harder to anchor — and makes the documents on the specific building matter more than the average of the area.",{"heading":56,"text":57},"What stays open in January","This is the question that separates the two towns most reliably. Benidorm runs twelve months a year, with a winter season of northern European visitors, and it has normalised services in English, German and Dutch — doctors, banks, bars, trades. Villajoyosa stays open in winter for a different reason: it has an economy that is not tourism. The port still lands fish and the lonja still auctions the catch in the morning; chocolate has been made here industrially since the nineteenth century; and the public hospital that serves the whole comarca, including Benidorm, is in this municipality.\n\nIf you intend to spend a winter rather than an August, measure exactly that: bakery, market, health centre, school, pharmacy, bus. In a town with its own economy the answer is usually «most of it». What you will find less of is the service in your own language that Benidorm takes for granted.",{"heading":59,"text":60},"Living here without two cars","A narrow-gauge tram, the TRAM, runs through the municipality and has a stop in the town. Line 1 links Alicante with Benidorm via El Campello and la Vila; in Benidorm it connects with line 9, which continues up the coast towards Dénia. That combination reaches both centres without a car, which matters more in a second home than it sounds: it can mean one car instead of two, and teenagers who move about on their own.\n\nBy road, the N-332 is the coastal route between the two towns and the A-7 the motorway to the Costa Blanca airport, around forty kilometres away. A car remains necessary in the hillside developments, away from the tram and the shops — a distinction worth checking on a map before falling for a view.",{"heading":62,"text":63},"What is actually for sale, and what is not","Supply in la Vila is mostly resale: the old quarter, blocks built between the nineteen-seventies and the nineties along the urban beach, and scattered schemes on the strip facing the sea. New construction exists but is small in unit numbers and arrives plot by plot.\n\nThat cuts both ways. There is less competition for each home and less pressure to decide in one afternoon; there is also less to choose from. If you want new construction with a particular layout and outlook, you will probably wait for something to come up or buy an older home and renovate. And buying inside the painted old quarter means buying inside a protected area: façade, joinery, roof and colour are not decided at home, the town hall sets the conditions, and those conditions change both the budget and the timetable of a renovation. Read them before you sign anything.\n\nOne more consequence, and it is financial: a small market is a less liquid market. Selling here usually takes longer than selling in Benidorm's Levante, because at any moment fewer buyers are looking. If your horizon is short, that weighs.",{"heading":65,"text":66},"Three purchases inside one town","On the seafront, above the urban beach, sit blocks from the seventies and eighties with open views. These are buildings that age in salt air: joinery, terrace waterproofing, façades. Buy the view, but ask for the minutes of the owners' meetings, the building's technical inspection report and any derrama — the one-off levy voted for works — already approved. In the old quarter you buy character and pay for stairs, narrow streets and conditioned building works. Inland and up the hillsides you buy floor area, terrace and parking, and you pay in driving.\n\nIn all three cases the basic check is the same and it is yours to make: the nota simple from the Registro de la Propiedad for the registered owner, the registered surface and any charges; the latest IBI receipt for the municipal property tax; and the real year of construction. If the home was refurbished, ask for the municipal licence for that work — an unpermitted renovation is inherited with the house.\n\nSAVO is designing a building in this municipality. Today it exists in 3D visualisations and in the master plan drawing: nothing built, nothing for sale, no date. That is why this page offers you no home — only a way of looking at the ones that already exist.",[68,71,74,77],{"q":69,"a":70},"Is Villajoyosa quieter than Benidorm?","In winter, clearly: it is a town with its own economy and no mass seasonal tourism. In July and August the centre, the urban beach and the port fill up, and the summer patron-saint festivities draw large crowds. The stable difference is not the summer, it is the rest of the year.",{"q":72,"a":73},"Is a resale negotiated the same way as new construction?","No. In a resale the seller is usually a private individual and price, dates, furniture and repairs are all on the table. In new construction a company sells against a list of conditions, and what normally moves is the finishes and the payment schedule. In both cases only what ends up in the contract counts.",{"q":75,"a":76},"What is paid on top of the price of the home?","The tax that matches the type of purchase — ITP in a resale, IVA plus AJD stamp duty in a new home — then the notary, registration at the Registro de la Propiedad and, if there is a mortgage, the valuation. The rates and the amounts are confirmed for your case by your own tax adviser, not by a web page.",{"q":78,"a":79},"Can I live here without speaking Spanish?","You can manage, but less easily than in Benidorm, where services in English, German and Dutch are normal. Here Spanish and Valencian are the working languages of the town hall, the health centre and the trades. For the purchase itself that matters less — the documents are in Spanish in both towns, and a sworn translation or an interpreter at the deed is the usual answer.",[81,148,212,279],{"slug":43,"title":82,"teaser":83,"metaTitle":84,"metaDescription":85,"h1":86,"intro":87,"forWhom":88,"includes":93,"howItWorks":109,"model":125,"faq":128,"related":144},"How to read a Spanish advert","Almost every figure in a Spanish advert is true and almost none of them is measured the same way. What each square metre means, what the photographs leave out, and how much the person who published it can actually promise.","Property listing in Spain: how to read one properly","Property listing in Spain, decoded: útil, construida and computable floor areas, what «a reformar» commits anyone to, and what the publisher can promise.","Reading a Spanish property listing without walking into surprises","A Spanish property listing is a sales text, not a register entry: almost all of its figures are true and almost none of them is measured the same way. Knowing who wrote the advert and which word it used for each square metre removes half the surprises of a viewing.\n\nYou are not looking for lies, you are looking for translations, and here some of them are literal: the decisive words stay Spanish on every document. The same flat can appear with three different floor areas, with its condition described in two elastic words, and with a gallery chosen so that nothing is left over. Three questions and one dimensioned plan correct all of it.",[89,90,91,92],"Buyers comparing homes across Spanish portals who find that the square metres do not match from one advert to the next.","Buyers flying in for a few days who want to decide in advance which viewings are worth the time.","Buyers who meet «a reformar» or «para entrar a vivir» and cannot tell how much either phrase commits anyone to.","Buyers who cannot tell whether they are talking to an agency, to a portal or directly to the company building the flats.",[94,97,100,103,106],{"title":95,"text":96},"The three floor areas behind one property listing","Superficie útil is the floor you can walk on, measured inside the walls: it answers whether the table fits. Superficie construida is measured outside and includes walls, partitions and service ducts; it is usually the figure in the deed and on the developer's price list. And there is a third number that mixes the interior with part of the terrace: the common commercial practice is to count a fraction of the terrace, often half, and add it. That mixed figure — some adverts call it computable or «superficie total» — is not standardised and depends on who calculated it. One short question settles it: of the metres you advertise, how many are under a roof and enclosed? Expect the answer to be in metres, not feet, and expect the deed to use construida.",{"title":98,"text":99},"«A reformar», «a estrenar», «para entrar a vivir»","All three describe condition and none of them obliges anybody by itself. «A reformar», for renovation, means the seller already assumes work is needed, and usually points at old installations: wiring, plumbing, exterior joinery. «Para entrar a vivir», ready to move into, means habitable, not updated. «A estrenar», brand new, tells you nobody has lived there — not that the sale is a first transfer: a never-occupied flat resold by an investor is second hand for every legal purpose. What matters sits underneath those labels — whether the energy certificate is current, whether the building has passed its technical inspection, whether the owners' meeting has approved a derrama, a one-off levy for works on top of the ordinary service charge — and none of that follows from the adjective. It is asked.",{"title":101,"text":102},"Photographs say less than they appear to","Spanish estate photography is shot wide-angle at the best hour of light, and that is not a trick, it is the trade. The informative part is the inventory of what is missing. No picture of the kitchen, the bathroom or the drying area usually means those are the least presentable rooms. No picture of the entrance hall, the stairs or the façade means the building is. No shot from the window means the view is the neighbour. And an image of a home not yet built is a 3D visualisation rather than a photograph: it should say so, because materials, planting and furniture can change in the finished building.",{"title":104,"text":105},"The dimensioned plan is the most honest part of the advert","A plano acotado — a plan with measurements written on it — gives in one page what no gallery gives: the real layout, the metres of each room, the width of the corridor, where the load-bearing walls run, which rooms could be sacrificed and which way each window opens. If it carries a north arrow it also gives the orientation, which on this coast decides the temperature of the home in August. An advert without a plan is not suspicious, but a plan without dimensions is decorative: good for imagining, useless for comparing. In new construction the dimensioned, signed plan is also a contractual document, and it belongs in the contract as an annex.",{"title":107,"text":108},"Who publishes a property listing, and what each of them can promise","A portal is a noticeboard: it hosts the advert, does not answer for its content and has never seen the home. An agency acts on the owner's instructions and can commit only what those instructions allow, which almost never includes the final price or the payment terms. A promotor sells what it builds itself and is the only party that can commit specifications, dimensions and timing, because it is the party that will answer for them; in exchange it will only ever show you its own scheme. The same flat published by three senders produces three different texts, and the question that orders everything is whose advert it is: whoever signs it is whoever has to stand behind it in writing afterwards.",[110,113,116,119,122],{"title":111,"text":112},"First, who signed the advert","Before reading the features, find the sender: trading name, company, telephone and, where it appears, a professional or regional agent registration number. An advert with no identifiable sender is an advert nobody will stand behind. That detail also explains the tone of the text and how much of what it promises can travel into a contract.",{"title":114,"text":115},"Then, which floor area is quoted and where it is recorded","Ask for the figure with its surname — útil, construida, with common parts — and ask which document it appears in. Construida is recorded in the deed and in the división horizontal; the catastral figure sits in the Catastro, and the two do not always agree. That discrepancy is ordinary and can be corrected, but it is better known before you negotiate than at the notary's desk.",{"title":117,"text":118},"Next, the referencia catastral and the nota simple","The referencia catastral is the twenty-character code that identifies the exact property in the Catastro, with its recorded surface and boundaries. The nota simple, a short extract from the Registro de la Propiedad, names the registered owner and lists the mortgages, charges or seizures over it. The two registers are separate things and do not check each other. Both searches are yours to make without the seller's involvement, and together they turn an advert into a specific property.",{"title":120,"text":121},"How to compare two listings that look identical","Put both homes in the same unit before comparing: útil in both cases, terrace counted separately, and the recurring costs — community charge, the municipal property tax known as IBI, approved derramas — written beside each one. The ratio between útil and construida tells you by itself how much is lost to walls and corridors. In that format, two adverts that looked equivalent almost never are.",{"title":123,"text":124},"Finally, the viewing with the advert printed out","Go with the text and the plan in your hand and test what they claim: the rooms that were advertised, the orientation, the state of the exterior joinery, damp on ceilings and at the foot of the walls, the water pressure, the noise with the window open. Whatever the advert promised and the viewing does not confirm has to end up written into the contract or taken out of the price.",{"title":126,"text":127},"What you can check yourself, and whom you ask for the rest","Without asking anyone: the referencia catastral, surface and boundaries in the Catastro; the owner and the charges in the nota simple from the Registro de la Propiedad; zoning and licences at the ayuntamiento; and the sender's company in the commercial register of the country where it is incorporated. In new construction the licencia de obra also carries a municipal file number.\n\nFrom the seller or the agency you ask for what is in their hands: the dimensioned plan, a current certificado de eficiencia energética, the statutes and the minutes of the last owners' meeting, the certificate that the service charges are paid up, the latest IBI receipt and, in a new home, the memoria de calidades and a copy of the guarantee covering sums paid on account.\n\nTwo habits save a foreign buyer more than any translation. Ask who pays the person advising you, because in Spain the agency usually works for the seller even when it is entirely pleasant to you. And remember that the notary who reads the deed aloud is a public official checking the document, not your lawyer; if you want someone on your side, you hire an abogado separately. Nothing here is a promise from us and none of it replaces either of them. It is the list of what can be checked and the name of whoever holds it — plus one rule that ends most arguments: what does not end up in the contract or in a signed annex was never promised, whatever the advert said.",[129,132,135,138,141],{"q":130,"a":131},"Why does the same flat show different floor areas on two portals?","Because each advert quotes a different surface without saying which. One may be giving the construida from the deed, another the catastral figure, another the interior plus part of the terrace. None of them is necessarily lying: they are answering different questions. It is settled by asking for the figure with its surname and for the document it appears in.",{"q":133,"a":134},"Does a terrace count as floor area of the home?","It is floor area of the home, but it is not enclosed covered space, which is why commercial practice counts only a fraction of it. The problem appears when it is added without warning: a flat with a large terrace can be advertised with the same metres as one with a much bigger living room. Ask for the two numbers separately and compare interior with interior.",{"q":136,"a":137},"Can I trust the service charge quoted in the advert?","As an order of magnitude, not as a fact. The charge is approved by the owners' meeting each year and can rise, and on top of it sit derramas, one-off levies voted for building works that never appear in the ordinary charge. The documents that settle it are the minutes of the last meeting and a certificate showing no debt to the community.",{"q":139,"a":140},"What does it mean when an advert gives no exact address?","It is common and rarely serious: the seller is keeping the neighbours from knowing, or another agency from poaching the instruction. What should be given before you travel is the area precisely and the referencia catastral once you ask seriously. If that is withheld too, what is missing is not the address: it is the identification of the property.",{"q":142,"a":143},"Are the images of a new scheme photographs of the building?","No. While the building is unbuilt they are 3D visualisations and must be identified as such. They show the intention of the project: geometry and layout usually hold, while materials, planting, furniture and views can shift. What binds is not the image but the dimensioned plan and the memoria de calidades that get signed.",[145,146,147],"memoria-de-calidades","cuota-de-participacion","promotor-constructor-y-api",{"slug":149,"title":150,"teaser":151,"metaTitle":152,"metaDescription":153,"h1":154,"intro":155,"forWhom":156,"includes":161,"howItWorks":177,"model":190,"faq":192,"related":208},"obra-nueva","What «obra nueva» means","Spanish law calls a home new because nobody has ever owned it, not because it looks modern. That one line decides which tax you pay, which guarantees you inherit and where your money has to sit while the building goes up.","New-build in Spain: the law, the tax, the guarantees","New-build in Spain: what first transfer means, why the home is taxed under IVA instead of ITP, which guarantees the LOE gives you and how deposits are secured.","What makes a home a new-build in Spain, and what «obra nueva» changes for a foreign buyer","A new-build in Spain is not a modern flat: it is the first transfer of a home nobody has ever owned, sold by the company that promoted it. That definition, not the age of the building, decides which tax you pay, which guarantees follow the home and how your money must travel.\n\nThe Spanish term you will see on every document is obra nueva, and its opposite is segunda mano — second hand. Neither word describes the finishes. A building completed years ago that never had an owner is still a first transfer; a flat gutted and rebuilt by a private owner is not, however convincingly the advert says «a estrenar», brand new.",[157,158,159,160],"Buyers comparing a flat advertised as «a estrenar» with one sold by a developer, without knowing whether the two are the same kind of purchase at all.","Buyers who will pay instalments before the building exists and want to know where that money is legally required to sit in the meantime.","Buyers who have heard that new housing «pays more tax» in Spain and want to know which tax, who sets the rate and who files it.","Buyers who want to know whom they complain to, about what, and for how many years once the keys are handed over.",[162,165,168,171,174],{"title":163,"text":164},"New-build, resale and the words in between","Spanish law sorts homes by their place in the chain of transfers, not by their age. Primera transmisión is the sale that goes from the promotor to the first owner of that home; everything after it is segunda mano, however immaculate the flat. «A estrenar» (never lived in), «reformado» (renovated) and «como nuevo» (as new) are commercial descriptions of condition, not legal categories, and none of them moves a flat across that line. The consequence shows up in money twice: the tax you file and the guarantees that travel with the home are different on each side.",{"title":166,"text":167},"The seller of a new home is the promotor, not the builder","The promotor is the party that decides to build, puts up the land and the capital and answers for the result. It is not the constructora, which carries out the works under contract, and not the comercializadora or the agency, which show the home and are paid to introduce you. English has no clean equivalent: «developer» is close, «promoter» is a false friend, and the word on your contract will be promotor. Whoever opens the show flat may well not be the party that signs with you. The contract names one company, with its registered name, its tax number and its registry details, and that company — not the brand on the brochure — carries the obligation.",{"title":169,"text":170},"Why a new-build is taxed under IVA and not ITP","A resale home is taxed under Impuesto de Transmisiones Patrimoniales, ITP, which the regional government collects. A first transfer instead carries IVA, Spanish VAT, and the deed is additionally subject to Actos Jurídicos Documentados, AJD, a stamp duty on the notarial document. These are not two names for one thing: they are filed on different forms, with different administrations, and the rates are set by each region and each moment, so the number is confirmed by your adviser and not by a web page. Notary, Land Registry and the gestoría that files the paperwork are paid in both cases and are separate from all of it.",{"title":172,"text":173},"Guarantees start with the building, not with your purchase","The Ley de Ordenación de la Edificación, the LOE, is the building act, and it fixes three guarantee periods counted from the recepción de la obra — the formal handover of the finished works: one year for finishing defects, three for anything affecting habitability (damp, insulation, installations) and ten for anything structural. The promotor answers to the buyer alongside the builder and the technicians who signed, and a new home also carries compulsory insurance for structural damage. These guarantees belong to the property: sell inside the period and the next owner keeps what is left. The libro del edificio, the building book, is where the project, the materials and the required maintenance are written down.",{"title":175,"text":176},"Money you hand over before the flat exists","While the works advance you pay for something that is not yet in your name. Spanish law is explicit about that gap: cantidades a cuenta — sums paid on account — must go into an account kept separate from the rest of the promotor's assets and used only for the works, and must be covered by a bank guarantee (aval) or an insurance policy for the amount handed over plus interest. If the home is never delivered, repayment is claimed from the guarantor, not from anybody's goodwill. So what you ask for is not an explanation: it is the individual certificate issued in your name and the number of the account each payment enters.",[178,181,184,187],{"title":179,"text":180},"Land, zoning and the licencia de obra","Before a sales plan exists there is a plot with a specific classification in the town's plan general: which use is allowed, how much floor area and how many storeys. On that basis the ayuntamiento, the town hall, grants the licencia de obra, the building permit, which is an administrative file with a number. Both can be consulted without asking the seller's permission. A well-made 3D visualisation proves neither of them.",{"title":182,"text":183},"The obra nueva declaration, horizontal division and the Registry","During construction a dirección facultativa — the architect and the technical architect — certifies what is built. At the end they sign the certificado final de obra, and with it the declaración de obra nueva and the división horizontal are executed before a notary. That is the moment the flats stop being parts of a plot and start to exist as separate properties in the Registro de la Propiedad, each with its floor area and its cuota de participación, the share of the building that fixes its vote and its service charge.",{"title":185,"text":186},"The licencia de primera ocupación","Once the building is finished the town hall checks that what stands matches what was authorised and issues the licencia de primera ocupación, the first-occupancy licence. It is the document that turns completed works into a home that may be lived in, connected to the utilities and transferred by deed in the normal way. Without it there is a building standing up and an administrative problem, and the two should not be confused. Ask for the number and the date, not for reassurance.",{"title":188,"text":189},"When a home stops being obra nueva","The first transfer exhausts the status. The second sale of the same flat is a resale even if nobody ever slept in it, and it goes back to ITP. One detail gets missed: the guarantee periods run from the recepción de la obra, not from the date of your deed. Buying a home finished some time ago and never sold means inheriting the years of cover that are left, not starting them from zero.",{"title":126,"text":191},"Public information is consulted without anyone's permission, and two registers that foreigners usually merge are in fact separate. The Catastro is the tax authority's description of the physical property — reference number, surface, boundaries, a map — and it says nothing about who owns it. The Registro de la Propiedad is the legal register of ownership and charges, and its nota simple, a short extract anyone may request, names the registered owner and lists mortgages, seizures and annotations. Zoning and buildable volume sit in the plan general published by the town hall; the licencia de obra is a municipal file with a number; and the company that will sign with you is checked in the commercial register of the country where it is incorporated.\n\nThe rest is asked of the promotor, because it is his: the dimensioned floor plan of your home with the surfaces broken down, the memoria de calidades (the written specification of materials and installations), a copy of the aval or insurance policy for the sums paid on account issued in your name, the certificado final de obra and the licencia de primera ocupación once they exist, and the libro del edificio at handover.\n\nOne more thing a foreign buyer should know before the day of signing. The notario is a public official who checks the deed and the identity of the parties and warns both sides; he is not your lawyer and does not negotiate for you. If you want someone on your side of the table, that is a separate abogado, hired by you. This list is not a guarantee we give you and replaces neither of them. When a document «is not ready yet», that is not a matter of trust: it is information about the stage the project has reached, and it should be read that way. The check applies to any promotor, this one included.",[193,196,199,202,205],{"q":194,"a":195},"Is a renovated flat a new-build?","No. If the home has already had an owner, the sale is a later transfer, however complete the renovation. The advert may fairly say «a estrenar», since nobody has lived there since the works, and the purchase is still filed under ITP and still comes without the guarantees of new construction.",{"q":197,"a":198},"Is a home nobody has lived in always a first transfer?","Only if the seller is the promotor and this is the first time that home changes hands. If the promotor transferred it earlier to another company, a bank or an investor, what you are buying is already the second sale. The useful question on a viewing is not how old the building is, but how many times the flat has been sold.",{"q":200,"a":201},"Do the guarantees run from the day I buy?","No: from the recepción de la obra. That is why it is worth looking at the date on the certificado final de obra and on the handover record before valuing a finished home that has been unsold for a while. The libro del edificio holds those dates, and with them you know how much of each period is still alive.",{"q":203,"a":204},"What is an NIE and do I need one?","The NIE is the Spanish tax identification number for foreigners. You cannot sign the deed, file the purchase tax or register ownership without it, so it is applied for early rather than in the week of signing. You will also need a Spanish bank account, because the deed has to identify each means of payment — amount, date and originating account — one by one.",{"q":206,"a":207},"What if the building is never finished?","That is what the guarantee on sums paid on account is for: repayment is claimed from the bank or the insurer that issued the certificate in your name. Which is why that paper is requested before the first payment and not after. Without it there is a transfer to a company and no route back.",[209,210,211],"itp-o-iva-en-obra-nueva","libro-del-edificio-y-garantias","licencia-de-primera-ocupacion",{"slug":213,"title":214,"teaser":215,"metaTitle":216,"metaDescription":217,"h1":218,"intro":219,"forWhom":220,"includes":225,"howItWorks":241,"model":257,"faq":259,"related":275},"comprar-piso","The purchase, document by document","A Spanish purchase is not a sequence of feelings but a chain of papers signed in a fixed order. What each one is, who issues it, and what to look at before the money moves.","Buying a flat in Spain: the papers, one by one","Buying a flat in Spain document by document: nota simple, reserva, arras, contrato privado, escritura and handover record. Who issues each and what to check.","Buying a flat in Spain is a chain of documents, not a single decision","Buying a flat in Spain looks little like the story told on viewings: it is not a decision taken on one day but a chain of papers signed in a fixed order. Each has a different issuer, and almost all of them can be read before anybody hands over money.\n\nThis guide follows the documents rather than the mood. The papers that exist without you, the ones your deal creates, the ones that describe the building, the ones that prove who is selling, and the ones Spain will ask of you as a foreigner. Set out that way, the purchase stops holding surprises and starts holding a checklist.",[221,222,223,224],"Buyers signing their first Spanish purchase who do not know which paper comes before which.","Buyers who have already chosen a home and want to know what can be read before committing money.","Buyers purchasing from another country who need to know which steps require their physical presence and which do not.","Buyers who hear reserva, arras, contrato privado and escritura used as though they were the same thing.",[226,229,232,235,238],{"title":227,"text":228},"Before buying a flat: the papers that exist without you","The property has a history of its own, written before you appear. The nota simple from the Registro de la Propiedad gives the registered owner, the surface the home is registered with, and the mortgages, seizures or annotations over it; anybody may request it. The Catastro adds the referencia catastral, the cadastral surface and the boundaries — a separate register, describing the physical thing rather than who owns it. The certificado de eficiencia energética, the energy certificate, is supplied by the seller and issued by a technician. From the comunidad de propietarios, the owners' association every Spanish block has by law, come the statutes, the minutes of the last meeting — where approved derramas, the one-off levies for works, appear — and a certificate that the charges are paid up. From the town hall: the licence file and the latest receipt for IBI, the municipal property tax.",{"title":230,"text":231},"The documents your deal creates","The hoja de reserva takes the home off the market and fixes property, price, annexes and the deadline for signing the private contract; it normally involves handing over money. The contrato privado de compraventa, with or without arras, is where nearly everything is actually decided: the description of the property, the surface, the annexes and whether they are separate registered units, the price with the tax shown separately, the payment schedule, who pays which cost and what happens if either side fails to perform. The escritura pública before a notary transfers ownership, and the later entry in the Registry is what protects it against third parties. The acta de entrega, in a new home, is where defects are recorded on the day of the keys.",{"title":233,"text":234},"The building's own documents, when it is new","A newly finished building has a file of its own, and it is worth asking for all of it. The licencia de obra authorises construction; the certificado final de obra, signed by the architect and the technical architect, closes the works; the declaración de obra nueva and the división horizontal create each home as a separate registered property with its cuota de participación, the share that fixes its vote and its charge; the licencia de primera ocupación allows the home to be occupied and the utilities connected; the libro del edificio holds the project, the materials and the maintenance; the memoria de calidades describes what was installed inside; and the aval or insurance for sums paid on account protects money handed over while the works advance.",{"title":236,"text":237},"The documents of whoever is selling","Two things have to be proved: that they own it and that they may sign. A private seller shows the title and identification; someone signing for another shows a poder notarial, a notarial power of attorney, and it is worth reading exactly which powers it contains. A company shows its full registered name, its tax number, its registration details and who represents it with sufficient authority; the commercial register of the country of incorporation confirms that the company exists, who administers it and that it is not in liquidation. In a new home there is one check more: that the company signing with you is the same one recorded in the Land Registry as the owner of the plot.",{"title":239,"text":240},"The documents Spain will ask of you","The NIE is the identification number any foreigner needs in order to sign and to pay tax in Spain; without it there is no deed and no tax return. You will also need a Spanish bank account to pay from, because the deed has to identify every means of payment one by one: amount, date and originating account. If you will not be present at the signing, a notarial power of attorney in favour of whoever represents you — apostilled and translated by a sworn translator if it is granted outside Spain. And if you borrow, the lender's own file, which runs on its own calendar and is not part of the seller's paperwork. One warning worth repeating: the escritura is read in Spanish, and an official interpreter or a sworn translation is your protection, not a formality.",[242,245,248,251,254],{"title":243,"text":244},"Check before you pay","The healthy order is to read the property before talking about money: nota simple, Catastro, licences and the state of the community. It is the only phase that costs nothing and the only one in which you can still change your mind without consequences. Almost everything that goes wrong in a purchase was written in a document that could have been requested here.",{"title":246,"text":247},"The reserva: what is blocked and what is not","A reservation commits the seller not to offer the home to anybody else while the agreed period runs, and commits you to negotiate on the written terms. It transfers nothing. What decides its reach is not the title of the paper but its content: there are reservation forms that describe the full price, the payments and the signing date and are in truth a contract of sale under another name.",{"title":249,"text":250},"The private contract: nearly everything is decided here","It is the longest document and the least read. Whatever the brochure or the viewing promised and the contract does not record is, in practice, not promised: finishes, orientation, joinery, air conditioning, parking space and storage room go into the text or into an annex signed with it. Two clauses deserve attention of their own: who decides whether a substituted material is «equivalent», and what exactly happens if either side fails to perform. Note also how the arras are qualified — penitenciales, which let a party walk away at a fixed cost, or penales, which do not — because the label changes your exit.",{"title":252,"text":253},"The signing and, afterwards, the Registry","Nothing is decided on the day of the deed: things are checked. In Spain the buyer chooses the notary, and it is worth asking for the draft with enough margin to read it alongside the nota simple. Remember what that official is: he checks the document and warns both parties, he does not act for you, and a lawyer of your own is a separate hire. Signing is not the end either — ownership is protected by registration, and before registering, the tax on the transaction has to be paid.",{"title":255,"text":256},"Buying a flat off plan: the same order, a different risk","Off plan the sequence is identical but inverted in time: you sign first, pay in stages and own at the end. That adds two indispensable documents and one habit. The documents are the aval or insurance policy for sums paid on account, with the individual certificate in your name, and the dimensioned plan attached to the contract. The habit is to ask that each payment fall due against a certified stage of the works rather than against a date in a calendar.",{"title":126,"text":258},"Yourself, with no intermediary: the nota simple at the Registro de la Propiedad; the referencia catastral, surface and boundaries at the Catastro; the licence file at the town hall; zoning in the plan general; and the selling company in the commercial register of the country where it is incorporated, with its administrator and its status.\n\nFrom the seller you ask for what is in his hands: title or power of representation, a current energy certificate, the community statutes and minutes, the certificate of charges paid up, the IBI receipt and, in a new home, the licencia de primera ocupación, the certificado final de obra, the memoria de calidades, the libro del edificio and a copy of the guarantee for sums paid on account. From the notary's office you ask for the draft deed early enough to read it.\n\nNone of this is a guarantee from us or legal advice: your notary and your adviser answer for your case. It is the inventory of what can be read and the name of whoever has to hand it over. The practical rule fits on one line: no payment before the document that justifies it, and no document signed before it has been read in full.",[260,263,266,269,272],{"q":261,"a":262},"Are the reserva and the arras the same thing?","No. The reserva sets the home aside for a period and, in most wordings, does not oblige you to buy. A contract with arras is already an agreed sale, and leaving it has a cost that depends on how those arras are qualified in the text itself. If the document does not say, the interpretation is rarely the one the buyer assumed.",{"q":264,"a":265},"Who chooses the notary and who pays for him?","In a Spanish property sale the choice belongs to the buyer, and it is worth exercising, because he is the one who will read the small print in your name. How the costs are split is agreed in the contract within what the law allows, which is why it is a clause to settle in the private contract rather than on the day of signing.",{"q":267,"a":268},"Can I buy without travelling to Spain?","Yes, through a notarial power of attorney in favour of your representative. Granted outside Spain it will normally need an apostille and a sworn translation. What cannot be delegated is the reading: ask for the draft deed and the private contract translated or explained before your representative signs for you.",{"q":270,"a":271},"What if the Registry surface and the Catastro surface do not match?","It is more frequent than it sounds and there are procedures to correct it. What matters is spotting it before you negotiate, because it affects the description of what you are buying and can delay registration. The notary's office sees it when assembling the file; you see it earlier by comparing the nota simple with the cadastral record.",{"q":273,"a":274},"Which paper proves the home may be lived in?","In new construction, the licencia de primera ocupación from the town hall, together with the certificado final de obra. With those the utilities are contracted and the deed goes through normally. Some regions also have a specific habitability document; what is required depends on where the property is, and it is a question for that municipality's town hall.",[276,277,278],"aval-de-cantidades-a-cuenta","certificado-final-de-obra","plusvalia-municipal",{"slug":280,"title":281,"teaser":282,"metaTitle":283,"metaDescription":284,"h1":285,"intro":286,"forWhom":287,"includes":292,"howItWorks":308,"model":324,"faq":326,"related":342},"inmobiliaria","Agency, promotor or builder","Whoever introduces you, whoever builds and whoever answers for the defects are three different parties. How to tell them apart, who pays each of them, and what to verify about the one that will sign with you.","Estate agency, promotor or builder: who is who","Estate agency, promotor, constructora and API: what each party does when you buy in Spain, who pays whom, who holds your deposit and what to verify first.","What a Spanish estate agency is, and what it cannot do for you","An estate agency in Spain is an intermediary: it introduces a seller to a buyer and is paid for doing so. It does not build, it does not answer for defects in the building and, unless expressly agreed, it is not the party selling you the home. Confusing it with the promotor changes whom you can later claim against.\n\nThe confusion is understandable, because in practice four roles share one office and sometimes one person. Separating them is not a matter of vocabulary: it decides who is paid, who holds your money and who carries the obligation when a crack appears.",[288,289,290,291],"Buyers dealing with an office that shows flats without knowing whether it sells on its own behalf or somebody else's.","Buyers who have heard that the seller pays the commission and want to know what they themselves are signing at a viewing.","Buyers about to transfer a reservation payment who do not know whose account that money should enter.","Buyers who want to know whom they will claim against if the building shows defects after handover.",[293,296,299,302,305],{"title":294,"text":295},"What an estate agency does, and the three things it does not","Its work is intermediation: it takes instructions on properties, publishes them, filters buyers, arranges viewings, negotiates and accompanies the deal to signature. It may also handle formalities, order valuations and assemble paperwork. What it does not do are three things credited to it daily: it does not own the property, so it cannot fix the price or the terms without the seller; it has built nothing, so it does not answer for construction defects; and it is not a party to the contract of sale, which is signed between seller and buyer. Its brochure binds nobody but itself, and only as far as it can be evidenced.",{"title":297,"text":298},"Promotor, constructora and dirección facultativa","The promotor decides to build, provides the land and the capital and takes the result: it is the party that answers to the buyer and the only one that can commit specifications and dimensions, because it signs them. The constructora carries out the works under contract with the promotor and answers for execution defects. The dirección facultativa — the architect and the technical architect — designs, supervises and certifies, and answers for design or supervision defects. Spanish law groups all three as agentes de la edificación with overlapping liability: towards the buyer the promotor answers in any case, and the internal split with the others is settled between them. No agency appears on that list.",{"title":300,"text":301},"API, colleges and registers: which title is required","The title of Agente de la Propiedad Inmobiliaria, API, exists, has professional colleges behind it and means accredited training — but since the activity was liberalised at the start of the century it is not required in order to intermediate in Spain: any company or professional may do it. Some regions have created their own register of estate agents, and in those regions entry can be compulsory, so it is a check to make in the region where the property stands. Being an API is not a guarantee of outcome, and not being one is not irregular in itself. What does say something is whether the business exists, which company it operates through and whether it carries professional indemnity cover.",{"title":303,"text":304},"Who pays the estate agency, and whom it therefore works for","The party that signed the instruction pays, and in most resale transactions that party is the seller: the commission comes out of his share of the price. Some agencies also charge the buyer for services of their own, and that has to be written and accepted before the viewing rather than implied at signature. In new construction the scheme differs: the comercializadora is paid by the promotor and the buyer pays it nothing, even though it handles him throughout. There is no established buyer's-agent tradition here, so the pleasant person guiding you is usually the seller's: that is not a defect, but it is worth knowing before asking for advice. Two questions settle it in a minute. Whom do you act for in this transaction, and who pays you? And is there any amount that will be charged to me, and in which document does it appear?",{"title":306,"text":307},"Who is holding your money while you decide","An agency may receive a reservation payment, but always on deposit and on the seller's behalf, with the purpose written down and with a record of whose money it is and on what conditions it is returned. When the home is new and sold off plan the rule is stricter and admits no intermediary: sums paid on account must enter the promotor's special account earmarked for the works and be covered by a bank guarantee or insurance in the buyer's name. A transfer of such sums into an agency's ordinary current account does not meet that scheme, and it is worth stopping there before ordering it.",[309,312,315,318,321],{"title":310,"text":311},"Verify the company before you judge the office","A well-fitted shopfront proves nothing. What proves something is the company: full registered name, tax number, registered address and registration, all consultable in the commercial register, with the name of whoever administers it and its status. That same data should appear on the contract, on the invoices and on the published advert. If the trading name and the signing company do not match, the question is not awkward: it is the first one.",{"title":313,"text":314},"Read the instruction form and the viewing note","Before you see the flat a paper usually appears to be signed: hoja de visita, nota de encargo, or a buyer exclusivity agreement. These are not formalities. They can contain an obligation to pay if you buy that property by another route, or an exclusivity period. They are read in full and signed as read; if something has to be struck out, it is struck out before you get into the lift.",{"title":316,"text":317},"Ask in whose name the contract is signed","At signature the contract of sale is made between the owner of the property and you, not with the agency. If the person opposite is not the owner, he has to produce a notarial power with sufficient authority, and it is worth reading which powers those are. In new construction the signing company must also be the one recorded in the Registro de la Propiedad as owner of the plot.",{"title":319,"text":320},"Separate the commission, the price and the tax","Ask for the items itemised in writing: price of the home, the tax that applies to the transaction, fees if any fall to you, notary, Registry and gestoría. Mixing everything into one figure makes two offers impossible to compare and usually hides a charge nobody has said out loud. An itemised breakdown also makes clear who issues which invoice.",{"title":322,"text":323},"What can be checked without asking anyone's permission","That the company exists and who represents it; whether it is entered in the estate agents' register of its region, where one exists; whether it carries professional indemnity and client-money cover; how long it has traded under the same name; and whether the property it is offering you is also published by other senders with different data. That last check costs nothing and brings the most contradictions to light.",{"title":126,"text":325},"On your own: the agency's company and the seller's in the commercial register of the country of incorporation, with administrator and status; the owner and the charges on the property in the nota simple from the Registro de la Propiedad; the referencia catastral in the Catastro, which is a different register and describes the thing rather than the title; the licence file at the town hall; and the regional register of estate agents where one exists. For a company registered elsewhere in the European Union, the VAT number can be validated online in the European system.\n\nFrom the agency you ask for its full tax identification, the document showing on whose behalf it acts, a written breakdown of any amount that falls to you, and its liability policy. From the promotor, when the home is new, you ask for the licencia de obra, the memoria de calidades, the dimensioned plan and a copy of the aval or insurance for sums paid on account issued in your name.\n\nThere are no promises from us here, and this replaces neither your lawyer nor your notary — and in Spain those are two different people: the notary is a public official who checks the deed, while an abogado acting for you is a separate hire. This is the list of what is verifiable and the name of whoever has to supply it. It is worth applying to everyone equally: to the agency that shows you the flat, to the promotor that builds it, and to SAVO as well.",[327,330,333,336,339],{"q":328,"a":329},"Do I need an agency to buy in Spain?","It is not compulsory: a buyer and a seller can go straight to the notary. Intermediation adds a filtered selection, local knowledge and handling of formalities. What it does not add, and is sometimes assumed, is responsibility for the state of the building or for the seller's solvency: that is checked with documents, agency or no agency.",{"q":331,"a":332},"Who answers if defects appear after handover?","In a new home, the promotor answers to the buyer alongside the builder and the technicians who signed, each for their part and within the guarantee periods the law sets. The agency that introduced the deal is not in that split. Which is exactly why it is worth knowing, before signing, which company holds the status of promotor.",{"q":334,"a":335},"Can I negotiate the commission if the seller pays it?","The commission is agreed between the owner and the agency, and you are not a party to that contract. What does concern you is that no amount falls to you that was not written down, and that the price you negotiate is the one that reaches the deed. Ask for the items broken down and check who issues each invoice.",{"q":337,"a":338},"Is it safe to transfer a reservation to the agency's account?","It can be done in a resale if the document states that the agency receives it on deposit on the seller's behalf, with the purpose, the destination and the return conditions written down. In new construction it does not fit: sums on account have to go to the promotor's special account and be guaranteed by aval or insurance in your name.",{"q":340,"a":341},"And if the same company is the promotor and sells without an agency?","That is common and shortens the chain: the person showing you the home works for the company building it and can commit what it signs. The trade-off is that you will only be shown its own scheme, so the comparison with the rest of the market is yours to make. What does not change is the verification: company, ownership of the plot, licence and the guarantee on your money.",[147,210,276],[],1791227523721]