Selling a property in spain

[steve watson]

Can anyone advise on selling a property in spain, what are the costs if any, and can you have the monies transferred from your Spainish bank account to your English account.
Is it the same as the uk Ie estate agent fees, solicitor fees

Thanks

[Sookie]

We considered selling whilst out in GA. We had Novadesta who quoted 5% and GA Homefinders quoted 3%

[masmu]

There was a discussion about selling in GA a few months ago under Estate Agents

I have copied and pasted my contribution to the thread in the hope that it may be of some help.  The sale of our casa went through in February.

"I know I am resurrecting an old post but thought our very recent experience in selling in GA might be useful to someone.

We bought our casa in lower Monte y Mar, from new, in 2006 and had years of lovely long holidays there.  We had always planned on putting the house on the market in 2021 but for various reasons, including the uncertainty of future travel, decided to bring that forward and went out there last October for 10 days (our first trip back for 12 months) to set the wheels in motion, arrange carriers to bring back some of our personal things, arrange to sell our car, and prepare the house for marketing (lots of trips to the bins and charity shop).  It transpired that we picked the 'perfect window' to get out there.  When we flew home in early November it was to a 14 day quarantine and then joining everyone else in the UK in Lockdown Number 2.

Everything was then handed over to Rosa Delia Sanchez, Inmuebles Global Europa. A local Spanish Estate Agent.

We were not really expecting anything to happen quickly because of the limited viewer market (little international travel, internal borders closed). However there was an encouraging number of viewings and some offers - below the asking price, which Rosa advised us not to accept.

Early this month we got the offer we had been waiting for and yesterday, 3 weeks from that offer, the sale was completed.

Rosas service was amazing. She is knowledgeable, professional, thorough, trustworthy and honest, working in our (the sellers) best interest at all times, and keeping us up to date every step of the way.  Very important at all times but even more so when we were here in the UK, 1500 miles away. Yesterday she was WhatsApping as things happened at the Notary, even sending us a photo of the buyers holding the keys to their new home.

We just can't thank her enough for everything she has done and would have absolutely no hesitation in recommending her to anyone wanting to sell or buy in the area."

The fee was 4% and Rosa handled all the legal work for us so no need for a solicitor and she had our Power of Attorney.  Let me know if you need any further information.

[steve watson]

Hi masmu did you have any issue getting the monies back to uk, what was the procedure, any costs ?

[John H]

Steve, when we sold our place I looked at the three different scenarios for sending the proceeeds of the sale back to the UK.

The first options I looked at were sending the Euros to our UK bank and letting them transfer it into sterling or letting Sabadell do the conversion and sending the Sterling to our UK bank......in all honesty there wasn't a lot of difference in the amount we would receive after all the fees had been charged.

The third option I looked at was repatriating the proceeds of the sale using Transferwise, now called Wise, this was the avenue I we used, using Wise we netted over £2,200 more than using the normal "High St banking route".

The funds were in our UK bank within 24 hours of pressing the button on my computer.

Obviously it was a fair amount and I had to send Transferwise proof of the sale from the notary office due to money laundering regulations.

Hope this helps.

Regards all

John

[John H]

Steve, I've just dug out my file from our sale, the solicitors charges were 900 Euros, that was for handling all the administration surrounding the sale, answering all the buyers questions, closing all our accounts such as water, electric, community administration, paying all costs associated with the sale, accompanying us to the notary office on the day of completion and claiming back our 3% retention which we received directly from the Agencia Tributaria into our UK bank account about 6 months after completion.

I negotiated a fee of 3.6% of the sale price including IVA with the estate agent, as in the UK dont accept the sale fee they quote to you, its always negotiable

I noted that additional costs we paid were 250 Euros for an Energy Performance Certificate, I think I paid over the odds for that, it was a legal requirement to have one when putting the house on the market.

We also paid 550 Euros for our solicitor to renew the Habitacion Certificate, the purchaser insisted on having an up to date one, again I yhink we paid over the odds but when you are a thousand miles away there's not a lot you can do!!

The sting in the tail was the Plus Valia Tax of 4500 Euros, the estate agents lead you to believe its an insignificant figure, the Ayuntamiento in Santa Pola when doing the calculations have a completely different view point!!

.

Regards all

John

[BeachLife]

Good to be reminded of the costs John (not that we will be selling anytime soon)

That plus valia has to be the biggest ripoff going. Very few people have seen house prices go up enough to warrant that tax. Plus valia should be on the original purchase price away from todays selling price. Not some number dreamt up by the council

[masmu]

Hi Steve

We used Currencies Direct (CD) to transfer the house proceeds to our UK bank account.

On the day of completion (3 weeks from the offer) Rosa Sanchez met the buyers, their bank (mortage provider) representative and the representative from CD at the Notary office in Santa Pola.   The buyers bank paid over their draft (from which the Plus Valia and Non-Residents tax had been deducted) to Rosa and she passed it to the CD guy along with the buyers deposit (less her fees).  CD rang us later that day and discussed when we wanted to trade the Euros to Sterling.  The rate was heading up (wrong direction for a sale) so we decided to trade immediately.  Within 2 or 3 days the funds were in our UK account.

Like John I have dug out some of the paperwork to check the other costs involved.
And as he said the Plus Valia and the Non-Resident Tax are ‘the sting in the tail’!

Rosa had a heated ‘discussion’ with the Ayuntamiento about how much they were going to hold back for the Plus Valia and ‘negotiated’ this down to just over 1K (plus admin fee around 150 Euros) which she is claiming back for us. 

To claim back the Non-Residents tax you have to use someone at solicitor or gestor/gestoria level.  We had already spoken to FAB (I know some people don’t rate them but we have always been happy with them) and Rosa went to their office directly from the signing at the Notary to put the wheels in motion (they turn verrrry slowly) to claim back the Non-Residents tax). FAB fee for this is 300 Euros plus IVA which we paid directly to FAB from our Spanish bank account.  We are still waiting for both of these amounts to be refunded to us.

Energy Certificate was 120 Euros
Cost of setting up Power of Attorney to Rosa Sanchez at Notary office was 60 Euros
Cost of Community Certificate (obtained from our community administrator) 30 Euros

No solicitor was used. 

Hope this helps.

[DaveG]

Hi Steve, one think I would add to the discussion is make sure you get a realistic valuation for your property. We have just sold but initially we went to two of the most recommended estate agents on this forum. Feeling that they were pricing our property for a quick sale for themselves we approached Lexington Realty who valued it £25k more. We realised £20k of that extra. Shop around.

[Blue and white stripes]

A friend sold through Lexington - he was very impressed with them.

[wilson]

From my limited experience of buying and selling properties in Spain over many years, the rules are identical to the UK, estate agents irrespective of how nice friendly and professional they are only have one priority and that is not you it’s their commission. The issue is always realising the best price for the vendor balanced with getting your commission sooner rather than later. The difference between 3% of 150k and 170k is 4500€ against 5100€ so the incentive to wait a lot longer and hold out for the best price isn’t important as 4500 for a few days work is a win. Sellers need to do their own research and decide what is an achievable price with similar properties don’t be pressured by the nice lady to drop your asking price. As we have all seen on Place in the Sun there is a belief that everything is negotiable and silly offers are made with the agent in many cases pushing the price down to get the all important 3%.

[Blue and white stripes]

Hi Masmu,
Who did the energy certificate for you?

[masmu]

Hi B & W Stripes

The Energy certificate was done by a guy called Javier I think.  Our agent arranged it.

I should also mention that I did a lot of homework on house prices in the area and had a price in mind before I discussed it with the agent.  Her figure was the same as mine. 

We had heard many stories, like Wilson mentioned, about agents urging sellers to accept a lower offer and stayed clear of those.

We did get a few lower offers at first which our agent told us not to even consider.  Then we got the asking price.  Happy days

Hope this helps

[John H]

Estate Agents.....I've just copied this from a post I made after we sold our place;

Just over a year ago we decided it was time to sell our holiday home in GA
We went down to one of the agents in the commercial centre and told them we wanted to sell......we described the property and they said advertise at X to achieve Y.....I know we all value our own property and I told them I thought their figures were on the low side.
They agreed to come to the house straight away and take a look.....they loved it, the first thing they said was “you can tell that this has never been rented out” “it’s immaculate”......they told us about the condition of some of the properties they were marketing, pretty grim!
So I asked in view of their visit what would the figures be......I was told as quoted in the office because it’s only the cheap ones that are getting “hits” on the website and being sold!!
I thanked them for their visit, jumped in my car and returned to the commercial centre to see agent number 2.......I think they’d attended the same course on how to be an estate agent, their indications of advertise at X and achieve Y were exactly the same.....again I invited them to come and look.....within half an hour they were at the house with the same glowing adjectives....again I asked in view of their visit what would the X & Y be......as I now expected the figures were the same
I thought I’ll give it one more go and visited Novadesta........he wouldn’t give me any figures until he’d researched and visited the property which he couldn’t do until the following day.
He arrived at the time agreed and the first thing he did was tell us what a special property we had, on the whole of the Novamar phases there were only 10 like it and what a brilliant aspect it had.....we knew we’d bought it for a good reason!!
He was extremely complementary on his internal inspection......we than came to the crunch....advertise at X to achieve Y......Y was 10% higher than the other agents had said.
We liked his enthusiasm, the research he had done and importantly we thought this guy will sell the house.
We agreed a fee.....it was less than the commercial centre guys wanted.....and signed the paperwork.
After 6 months and no sale we thought that possibly the guys at the commercial centre had got it right re the price and we had a chat to Novadesta re lowering the price, they told us in no uncertain terms not to....”it’s a great house waiting for the right buyer”.
I’m pleased to say they found the right buyers and today the sale was completed at the notary
Two of our friends knowing I’m a bit of a “nerd” and knowing how I research things listed their houses with Novadesta subsequent to us listing ours.....both have sold.
So, if your thinking of selling give them a visit, you may be pleasantly surprised

Regards all

John

[John H]

Just to add I received a message from a forum member yesterday whose experience with Novadesta wasn't the same as mine.
The guy I dealt with was Norwegian and he was superb, I did hear that he left GA a while ago and headed back to Oslo as his wife was homesick....his great service obviously didn't brush off on other members of the team!!
What's the saying "past performance is no...."
It does seem that the OP has last interest in the post.

Regards all

John