In July 07, we received our monies paid for the other property, which was great and a relief.
We could now focus on the cortijo, finding an architect to draw up the plans and get it passed though the Town Hall to obtain our building licence.
This took time, and thanks to the help of the estate agent and my Bank Manager we found architect who drafted plans on the brief I sent him, on what we required, although this was only managed though my Bank manager as he did not speak much English and I’m still trying to learn Spanish by attending evening classes. However, not having much luck in the learning process.
Not much happened over the coming months, the architect seemed to take a while as he needed to get access to the property, which had to be arranged though the estate agent and also once the plans was drawn they had the be sent to the college of architect in Almeria for they approval before he could submitted it to the Town hall.
Finally we received copies of the plans at the beginning of December and these was submitted the local Town Hall in November.
By the middle of December, the Town hall had agreed the plans and we would receive the Building licence in due course.
With all this now have done. We thought we could now move quickly and get mortgage from bank and quotes for the renovation, but no still things was moving slowly, so we planned a three day trip over at the end of January 08 to see if we could get things moving.
We stayed in a lovely guesthouse not far from where our property was and near our hopefully to be soon local Town, so we could look around, and find our way round.
We planned visits to bank, architect (who after arranging to meet on our visit was away on another project) and our solicitor. Why the hold up with obtaining the mortgage, as we how had everything in place that the bank required to process.
On visiting the solicitor on the last day we found out the reason why? The current owner had sold off part of the land, but his solicitor had not done all that should have, and the land and building had not been segregated, registries at town hall, land registry and at the cadastre, so on the deeds it only shows that the vendor only owns the building not the land that he is selling. Therefore, the solicitor has advised us not to do anything until the vendor has sorted this problem out, re- registries it showing the correct measurements of the property and land. That is why the bank will not loan us the money yet, until all the issue has been rectified.
It was good that our solicitor had found this out; it shows, as with the vendor that some do not, and it is not until you sell or have a good solicitor that things like this come to the surface.
Once again he we go again, another problem, what do we do?
To be continued.