Spanish Refund of Retention

[Rees Family]

We sold out property just outside Alicante in Nov 2012 and are still awaiting the 3% retention 4.200 € refund is this correct? Also would the cheque usually be made to us or our solicitor?

[Pazza]

Hello,

We had been advised by our solicitor in 2015 that the process took 6 to 9 months. In reality, it took 14 months. They really do like to hang on to your money.

The refund was paid into our bank account directly.

Is your solicitor acting on your behalf to recover the money? Ours charged 10%.

[Exowner]

Hi, I have waited a year for my 3% retention and have just been informed by my solicitor that if I go ahead I will be charged € 7000 capital gains tax as I made a profit on the sale and as such it is better not to put in a claim.

Is this correct? I thought the solicitor retained the 3% in case of debt against the property, is my solicitor just pocketing the money as I can’t believe they would wait a year to give me this information as they knew about the profit at the point of sale.

Any help or comments would be appreciated

[Pazza]

The reason for the retention was that many sellers did indeed skip off without paying capital gains in the hey days of the property market.

A rough check of what you paid originally in Euros versus the selling price should give you an indication of any capital gains due. In the hey days of the Spanish property market, it was also common to pay part of the asking price in cash (black money) which would increase the capital gain when selling as the true price was under declared, if you actually achieved a higher value!!

 

• This reply was modified 6 years, 7 months ago by Pazza.

[Barbara A]

So, we sold last year in June how do we get this money back?

 

[Pazza]

The solicitor that you used to sell the property is the best person to do this for you. They will charge for the service, ours wanted 10% of the cash recovered.

[David Sharman]

We sold our spanish property in july 2018, still awaiting 3% retention tax, no longer have any property in Spain, but still have a Spanish bank account, do we chase our lawyers for enquiring, or sit tight and wait

[Pazza]

If you sit back and wait you’ll never see the money. Chase them every week until they get fed up. For all you know, they may already have the money and are hoping that you have forgotten.

Spain is very good at taking money and very poor at returning it. We might moan about the UK but at least we have a legal system that works and is not in cahoots with the government.

[Exowner]

Never got ours back, I think it’s a solicitors perk

[Author]

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