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Property purchase check list
- 1. Advice from a Spanish lawyer or property consultant.
- 2. The seller’s escritura publica, or title deed, as registered in the Registro de la Propiedad.
- 3. A nota simple from the Property Registry showing that no mortgages are registered against the property.
- 4. Referencia Catastral. The number itself appears on the IBI receipt, but you want the full certification document, the Certificado Catustral, that describes the property in detail.
- 5. A check on the legality and plan parcial if you buy in an urbanisation, and assurance of a building permit if you buy a plot.
- 6. A paid-up receipt for the IBI, Impuesto sobre Bienes In,,webles, or the declaración de obra nueva.
- 7. Receipt for paid-up community charges and a copy of the Statutes if you buy in a condominium.
- 8. Copies of owner’s receipts for electricity, water, rubbish collection and even the telephone.
- 9. A contract, in Spanish, and a translation into your own language, with terms you understand.
- 10. A decision about your form of payment, whether in euros or other currency, and be sure to insist on declaring the fufl amount.
- 11. An escritura de compraventa signed before a notario.
- 12. Payment of fees and taxes, and the five per cent deposit to Hacienda if you buy from anon-resident, using Form 211.
- 13. An idea of how and when you will get your final escritura piThlica, which makes you the real owner.
Buying without an Escritura
Surprisingly often, the seller does not have an escriturapi~blica, in most cases for perfectly legitimate reasons or at least for reasons which will not affect you the purchaser.
One reason for owning property on a private contract only, without a public title deed, is that the property cannot be seized by the court in order to pay a debt of the owner. Only registered property can be attached by a court.
Another reason is simply to avoid the payment of the transfer taxes and fees, which can total 10 per cent or even more of the value. Or perhaps the owner wants to conceal assets, either from a creditor or the tax man, or an ex-wife, for example. When the Property Register is checked, there is nothing listed under that name.
On the Spanish Costas, where there was a freewheeling property market for some years, many properties changed hands so quickly as buyers sought quick profits that they simply did not register them. They just waited for the next buyer to carry out all the formalities, thus avoiding transfer taxes.
It is possible that a house you fancy has had two or three owners in the last five or six years and that not one of them ever got his final escritura pi2blica. It might he that the house does not legally exist, as it has never been dec’ared to the tax authorities in a declaración de obra nueva. The only legal document for the property simply refers to the plot of land and does not even mention the house.
Or you might buy a tract of land in the campo, the owners of which are seven brothers whose family has owned the land for a hundred years but never had a written document.
There are perfectly legal ways of solving all these problems.
You can have the piece of land made over to you by the original sel~er, three owners back. You yourself can make the declaración de obra nueva, even though you did not build the house.
But be carefuL If you want to establish the title through a series of private contracts, you may find that you are liable for quite a lot of back taxes, perhaps two or threep/us va/las which have never been paid by the previous owners. This tax may be charged to the present owner of the property.
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