Buy An Apartment In Spain

Community or Service charges

If you are looking to buy an apartment in Spain on a development, even if it is brand new, you or your Solicitor must speak to the President of the Community to make sure that there are no outstanding service or community charges.

If there is, the debts stay with the flat and the new owner-you!

On our development many buyers simply didn't know or feel the need to ask the question and had a horrible surprise when they realised that as the apartment had been part of the community for up to 6 months before they completed their purchase, it had an outstanding service charge for that period and the Developer had failed to notify them !

The developers response...

Tough luck you never asked the question!

• Most new built property is given to you in a sparse state although this is improving now. No Shower screens, toilet roll holders, towel rails etc. All we had was wires coming out of the walls, no lights

  And check to see if it comes with air conditioning.

• Find out what plants there will be in the garden

This may not sound like a huge expense but if you start adding up these costs and then add in all the furniture it can hurt the wallet when you buy an apartment in Spain!

I reckon a mid range estimate for finishing an average 2 bed apartment with good furniture, including all kettles, plates etc will be in the region of €10-15,000 depending on how much you shop around.

One final (I promise), in fact two final things to add onto the costs when you buy an apartment in Spain...

These are not really immediate but do affect the whole cost and yearly cost...

The service charge or community fee is the expenditure on the development, things like the gardening, swimming pool maintenance etc. All the yearly costs are estimated in advance and then divided according to how many apartments there are and how big they are.

The normal way to determine the service charge is to divide the total floor area of all the apartments or Townhouses combined, by the estimate for running the complex and then multiplying by the Square meterage for your property.

You mean you followed that...

A simple example..100 apartments, total m² of all apartments= 17,500m² in a complex with running costs of €100,000.

Your apartment has 80 m²

Your service charge would be €457 pa

80m² is 0.457% of the overall m² of the development, your service charge will therefore be .457% of €100,000.

Service charges vary from development to development and are affected by how many apartments there are and what facilities you have. They can be as low as €500 per year or as high as €5000, it all depends.

The big expenditure goes on Security, Gardens, Lifts and Swimming Pools, all things we want but need to consider when buying an apartment in Spain.

We live in a well run Urbanisation (complex) of 250 flats, with 24 Hour Security and Two swimming pools. Our Service charge is around €1800 per year (no lift). The apartments with lifts pay around €1000 more per year.

If you have less apartments and lifts to pay for you are looking at this becoming at least €4000 per year.

Each year you have to pay IBA, a kind of council tax and a wealth tax. Then when you sell the property if you are a non resident of Spain, you are liable to 35% Capital Gains Tax!

You should seek out advice on the costs of these taxes from your Solicitor when you buy an apartment in Spain.

Within this guide we also have advice and information on Buying property In Spain, Finding Property in Spain, Estate Agents in Spain, The Costs of Buying Property in Spain, Buying an Apartment in Spain, Buy to Let in Spain, New Developments In Spain, Off Plan Property Spain Property in Spain, Resale Property in Spain, Investment Property in Spain, Rental property In Spain, and Property Management in Spain