When is a property complete?

[Anonymous]

My purchase contract has a clause which states that the property must be completed within a certain month. The developer is allowed 60 days grace from the date stated the contract.

Is the property complete when the developer gives notice that all work is done or when the haibitation license is granted?

For example if the developer gives notice that the property is complete within the timeframe specified in the purchase contract but the habitation license is not granted within that timeframe, is the developer in breech of contract.

I understand that there can be significant delay in issue of habitation license.

[Anonymous]

Regardless of what the contract states, you would be a very brave man if you completed on the purchase of a property without the cedula or certificate of habitability from the local council.

My advise is to get an independently recommended lawyer before signing anything more or paying more.

[Anonymous]

Rawlins,

Thanks for your reply. Under no circumstances will I complete the purchase before the Habitation License has been granted. However I wonder at which point does the completion become delayed.

At the point at which the developer says the project is complete or at the point at which the Habitation License is granted.

I can’t see this detailed in my private purchase contract (althought this is in Spanish).

Regards

DGR

[Anonymous]

In my part of Spain, Valencia, developers understand completed to mean the issuance of the cedula. I cannot see how any other interpretation makes sense.

However, I have seen in this forum that some developers in other parts of Spain seem to have another idea of when a property is completed.

To understand the contract that you have signed and begin discussions with the developer you really need a lawyer.

[Anonymous]

Rawlins,

Thanks again for the advice, I have an independant lawyer. However my Spanish is very poor. My lawyers English is better but his responses some times are a little vague & a touch cryptic.
So far however he has represented my best intrests throughout, I thought however I may be able to get a quicker clearer indication using this forum ( which I think I now have).

Many Thanks

DGR

[Anonymous]

By coincidence, just after I wrote the above message, a local developer came into our office. She wanted us to help value some apartments in a block of flats that she had built nearby.

For various reasons, the council had refused to give a cedula five years ago when the building was finished and she had been patiently sitting on the property ever since. She told me today that the council had just told her that she would have the cedulas by September – and so she had decided to put them on the market.

The point being that she was very clear that she could not sell these flats until she had the cedulas in her hand.

[Anonymous]

We too have been told that every thing is ready to sign though we have had no word from our lawyer we have worked out that the complex is 8mths over due, on asking our lawyer about compensation from the builder she said she had asked him and said the builder did not want to pay any thing this appears to be the only answer. in the early days she had pointed out we had a clause in the contract which would pay 5% on delays it seems that things have changed.

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