Buying in Spain with Calida Homes
At Calida Homes, we do everything possible to ensure that your relocation to Spain is smooth sailing from beginning to end. Once you've found your dream home, our team of professionals takes the lead in guiding you through the legalities to complete your purchase with a minimum of inconvenience. The Calida Homes team includes English-speaking lawyers whose sole responsibility is to ensure that every aspect of your home or property purchase complies with Spanish property regulations.
Below, use our summary of the key points in purchasing Spanish property to get a head start on understanding and preparing for the legalities and tax regulations in purchasing your dream home in Almeria or along the Calida Coast.
Legalities
Similar to buying property in the UK, the first step in cementing the purchase of your Costa Calida dream home or Almerian property is issuing an offer to purchase the property. Our English-speaking lawyers assist you in this initial and important step, ensuring that every detail of your offer to purchase is correctly stated.
Your purchase contract (compra-venta) along with a holding deposit secures the property until your transaction is complete. In Spain, the required holding deposit amount is 10%.
This compra-venta typically lasts for about 90 days, during which time, your lawyer pursues a property search to ensure that the title deeds (Escitura) are in order, taxes are up to date, and there are no outstanding utility bills or other unpaid debts attached to the property.
At the completion of this property search, your lawyers arrange a meeting with all parties to the transaction, including a notary who witnesses the exchange of the Escitura for the cash balance due on the property. Other fees, primarily taxes, are due at this point. These fees are payable to your lawyer, usually within 30 days of the transfer of the title deeds.
Guide to Spanish property taxes and fees
A budget that adds 10% of the property price for payment of taxes and fees is generally ample.
In the example below, taxes and fees total a little over 5% of the property price:
- Purchase price = 100,000 Euros
- Declared Property Value = 50,000 Euros
- Transfer tax = 3500 Euros
- Lawyers fees = 600 Euros
- Notary Fees = 600 Euros
- Registry Fees = 500 Euros
Total budgeted property cost = 105,200 Euros
Transfer tax - Applied to second hand or re-sale properties, the transfer tax is 7% of the declared property value, not the purchase price. The declared property value is generally no more than half of the actual purchase price.
Lawyers fees - Depending on the amount of work involved, estimate lawyers fees at about 600 Euros.
Notary fees - Notary fees vary from 300 to 600 Euros, depending on the selling price of the property.
Registry fees - Your land registry fee pays for the transfer of the property deeds into your name and depending on the amount of work involved, ranges from 200 to 500 Euros.
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