Hi,
I can´t tell you the amounts of the maintenance charges for your urbanisation but I can tell you about the process and also give you some indication of our utility bills.
What normally happens is the urbanisation sets a budget for the year and agrees how much money to collect from each apartment. They calculate how much you pay depending on the number of square metres your property has, your garage space has (if you have one) and your trastero (secure lock up room - if you have one). All of the property owners have a say in how the budget is set once it is a mature community as there is an AGM. However, when an urbanisation starts up from new, like yours, the developers can set the budget to be anything they like. They have the majority of voting rights as they have not handed over all of the apartments.
It is only when most of the apartments have been accepted that the owners have enough voting rights to start making decisions about budgets etc. themselves. Normally, you pay an administration company to handle day to day matters on your behalf. Also, you elect a president to run the community (plus vice presidents if appropriate).
I suggest that you read all about this process in the book about Spanish law that I recommended in a separate post.
THIS IS A DANGEROUS TIME FOR YOU. Some unscrupulous developers can employ an administration company that they prefer and allocate a president they want and they have the right to set the level of payments for the owners. It has been known for various backhanders to be taken out of the community funds. So, my advice to any new community is for the owners to get together as quickly as they can and get on top of this process pronto. Try to allocate your own president that you trust. Preferably someone who speaks Spanish and lives here full time.
We have seen problems in a number of new urbanisations in Almerimar and I think it is probably a general problem anywhere in Spain. So be warned any try to take action on this soon.
In terms of utility bills. We live full time in a 3 bed apartment which has been converted into a 2 bedroom one. I have dug our some recent gas, electricity and water bills.
Gas - for a spot water heater and hob - 28 euros for 2 months
Water - 38 euros for 3 months
Electricity - lighting, dishwasher, washing machine, oven etc. - 69 euros for 2 months. Note we have aircon but we don´t use it very often. You probably have to be careful about how you use it, for heating in the winter or cooling in the summer, as it can cost quite a bit.
You also have to pay the local council for basura (rubbish collection) plus some other taxes including something like a council tax which doesn´t get calculated straight away for new builds. For a full list of all the taxes you need to take into account have a read of the book about you and the law in Spain that I recommended.
You can arrange to have all of your bills paid by direct debit from a local bank account here in Spain. We use the Cajamar bank on Darsena 3 as we have found they provide a good service, most of the people there speak some English (some are better than others) and their bank charges are lower than some of the other banks here.
I hope this information is useful to you.
John
This message was last edited by al24 on 6/15/2008.