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With Taylor Wimpey’s trademark quality, Lagunas del Sol II offers 2 & 3 bedroom townhouses in Rojales, Alicante, next to Ciudad Quesada and walking distance to all ameneties, with prices starting at just €114,920 (less than £100,000).

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See the properties for sale at Idealista.com

Between January and March this year, Spain received 9 million international tourists; an increase of 2.9% over the same three month period last year reveals the latest data from The Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Trade. Some of them will end up buying a home.

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According to the figures, the UK has remained Spain’s biggest fan with 1.8 million visitors in Q1 2011, while 1.47 million German and 1.2 million French visitors travelled to Spain to sample its delights.

It is thought that improved personal finances and a decrease in holiday prices have contributed to the rising tourist numbers, helping to alleviate some of the stresses of the Spanish economy. And of course, with the continued frequency and ease of flights into Spain, particularly the Costa Blanca with its new terminal at Alicante airport opening back in March as well as the new Corvera International airport opening in Murcia later this year, this boost in tourism to Spain will undoubtedly spell good news for property owners, boosting rental occupancy levels.

Ignacio Osle, Sales and Marketing Director of Taylor Wimpey de España, Spain’s leading house builder, explains,

“The Costa Blanca has been through a challenging period but the situation is improving with tourism to the area picking up. Seeing the Government and financiers investing in the infrastructure of the province is also immensely reassuring for both current and prospective property owners”

One of the most famous coastlines in Spain, the Costa Blanca attracts millions of visitors each year and is traditionally a favourite destination for foreign buyers drawn to the clear blue waters, miles of golden sandy beaches, quaint villages, sophisticated cafes and restaurants and an abundance of historical, cultural and leisure activities.

Stunning New Developments from Taylor Wimpey de España

Montesol

Sitting on the boarder of the Mediterranean, Calpe, famous for the Peñón de Ifach rock and renowned for being a popular beach town in Costa Blanca, is a haven for potential property buyers with Taylor Wimpey de España offering two new stunning developments.

The Calpesol residential complex is a brand new development consisting of spacious homes with landscaped gardens and a communal swimming pool. The properties have 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and costs from €155,000. The properties include terraces, private gardens and outdoor parking all finished to a high standard; ideal for full time living or potential holiday rental opportunities.

Now in its second phase, the Montesol residential complex is situated in one of the best areas of Calpe – Maryvilla and provides 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom apartments with a garden, sun terrace, air conditioning and hydro massage bath. With a price tag from €251,000, this development is a perfect investment, destined to attract buyers.

For more information please contact Taylor Wimpey España today on 08000 121 020 or visit www.taylorwimpeyspain.com. Outside the UK call 00 34 971 706 244.

The feeble state of the property market on the Costa Blanca has driven new home building down to levels last seen in the 60s or even before, reports the Spanish press.

The latest report (November 2010) from Alicante’s College of Technical Architects forecasts 2010 will end with just 1,851 housing starts in the province, 26pc down on 2009, and 97pc down on 2004, when Alicante’s housing starts peaked at 53,737.

You have to go back to around 1953 to find such a low level of housing starts, according to an article in the regional paper La Verdad.

Last year there were a paltry 11 housing starts in Denia, one of the most popular municipalities in Alicante. In Redován and Rafal, not a single new home was started last year.

Municipalities with less than 10 new homes started in 2010 include Benitatxell, Bigastro, El Campello, Castalla, Catral, Crevillente, Guardamar, La Nucia, Los Montesinos, Monforte, Monóvar, Pego, Polop, San Fulgencio, and San Miguel de Salinas, all familiar names in the holiday-home industry.

Alicante and the municipalities of the Costa Blanca have long been a popular destination for holiday-home buyers and snow-birds from Northern Europe. Whist the whole of Spain has been badly hit by the real estate crash, the debacle in Alicante is a sign that areas reliant on the holiday / expat home business are suffering the most.

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More stylish, quality new homes in the sun from blue-chip developer Taylor Wimpey. ‘Las Brisas de Alenda’ offers front-line golf town-houses in Alenda Golf, Monteforte del Cid (near Alicante), starting at an incredible price of just 189,000 Euros. If you are after a home in Spain, this is fantastic opportunity to buy on one of the best golf courses in Alicante, not far from the beach.

Learn more:

Las Brisas de Alenda – Montforte del Cid, Alicante, Costa Blanca

Or call now on (UK) 08000 121 020

Learn more:

Las Brisas de Alenda – Montforte del Cid, Alicante, Costa Blanca

Or call now on (UK) 08000 121 020

A recent article in El Pais reports on the problems experienced by people who bought flats in the Torre Lugano skyscraper – the 2nd highest in Benidorm with 148 metres, 48 floors, and 204 flats (it was marketed as the highest residential building in Spain, but has since been overtaken by the Gran Hotel Bali in Benidorm at 186m).

Furious owners claim the finish is far below spec and multiple construction faults have come to light since the building was delivered in June 2008, a year and a half late. A group of them are taking the developer, builder, architect, and technical architects to court demanding compensation of 28 million Euros.

The owners complain that:

- The building standards are shoddy, and corners were cut.
- The developer cut costs using inferior materials to those promised in the spec. For example, chipboard or cardboard was used in place of wood.
- Thanks to poor construction, the stairs to the offices have been sealed off in danger of collapse.
- The fire alarm never worked properly (towering inferno anyone?). Sometime it goes off up to 50 times a day.
- Construction faults in the foundations cause regular flooding in the garage, often involving waste water (sewage).
- Owners have had to spend 600,000 Euros dealing with these and other problems.

Vicente Villalba, the vice-president of the community of owners, says he feels “swindled”. “I was promised a luxury flat but it has ended up a disaster because almost nothing is up to scratch,” he told El Pais.

As a protest, the majority of owners are reported to have hung a for sale sign outside their flats.

Prices range from €160,000 for small lower floor flats, to €710,000 for the penthouses. The symbolic protest aside, 50 flats, or 25% of the building, are for sale, and that’s before counting those still on offer from the developer.

The owners are also suing the developer for building 5 floors more than urban planning laws permit.

The developer is a JV between Acciona – one of Spain’s biggest developers and constructors – and the Valencian savings bank Bancaja.

In recent years, 1,272 homes have been illegally built on rustic land around the town of Catral, most of them sold to British couples relocating to the region to enjoy their retirement. The town hall has plans to charge owners around 20,000 euros each for legalising their properties, whist developers and town planners involved in the scandal get off scot free.

Having consulted a legal expert in town planning at the University of Alicante, the AECU argue that the Valencian government and Catral’s town hall are to blame for failing to enforce town planning laws, and may even have encouraged illegal over-development in the area. As a result, owners may have a case to sue the authorities for damages, say AECU.

In this case, residents of the Monte Pego urbanisation on the Costa Blanca have been hit with tax hikes of almost 700%. “An average villa on the Monte Pego will see its local rates, known as the IBI, soar from €136 to €539 per year after the ‘catastro’ – similar to the UK’s rateable value – was reviewed in Madrid,” explains the RTN article. “Before 2008, the catastro rate for Pego land was €19 per square metre. The town hall requested a review and a new value was set in the Spanish capital of €149 per square metre – an increase of almost 700 percent.”

Even the town hall admits the increase in the IBI is excessive, explains the article. But now the increase has been set, the only way to fight it is through costly legal action that might not succeed.

Tax authorities exaggerate property sizes

It also appears that the tax authorities have been exaggerating the property sizes that rates are based on. Careful scrutiny of IBI bills shows that property sizes have increased from one year to the next. “It appear that this has happened to most if not all of us, meaning that we are paying tax on land that does not actually exist,” Stephen Joyce, a Monte Pego resident, told RTN.

Torrevisa, who bought local estate agent Masa International in 2003 for its European-wide sales network, is said to have built 30,000 homes in Torrevieja and southern Alicante (Vega Baja) in last 25 years, making it one of biggest builders of holiday homes in Spain.

Torrevisa is waiting to see if its request for court administration is accepted before making any official statement. Unwise business investments in Brazil and Croatia, along with the collapse in sales of holiday homes on Spain’s coast, are said to have been the undoing of the company.

Thousands of British and other European buyers will have bought homes either built or sold by Torrevisa and Masa International, both of which mainly dealt in cheaper homes.

Beach and cliffs at Javea, North Costa Blanca

A new boundary that nationalises 15 kilometres of private land on the coast near Javea (North Costa Blanca) is set to cause serious problems for the owners of around 1,000 villas in the area, reports the Spanish press. Around one hundred owners may have to demolish all or part of their properties as a result, causing a local outcry.

The controversy is the result of a new boundary between private and public land drawn up by the Coastal Department of the Ministry of the Environment. According to Spain’s now infamous Ley de Costas, or Coastal Law, which nationalised the entire Spanish coastline in July 1988, all property on the beach or shorefront is public property, and the government gets to decide where the boundary lies. 20 years later and the government is still defining the boundary, hence the present controversy.

The new boundary covers 15 kilometres of coastline, mainly cliffs, running from Cala Blanca to Granadella, between Javea and Benitatxell, and affects some 1,000 properties, mainly villas, of which around 100 properties may suffer some degree of demolition.

The Coastal Department says the new boundary will impose order on the town planning chaos left over after years of frantic building along the coast, and will help prevent any more new developments along the shore.

Property owners affected by the boundary are up in arms, supported by Javea’s Mayor Eduardo Monfort. The Mayor has denounced the new boundary as illegal and an infringement of property rights. The Coastal Depart argues that action is needed to protect the shore from further development, in an area where the cliffs have already started to collapse in some places.

Developers in Javea are calling this the final straw for a sector already deep in crisis. “The only demand left was from foreigners after villas on the seafront and now we are going to lose that as well,” one developer told the Spanish press.