10000000's of questions about moving permanently to Spain.

We have just put down the deposit down on Andalus Thalasa having visited the site early October and purchased a 3 bed apartment.  We purchased through MRI and have joined their aftersales.  This past week we were advised that rental for holidays would not be advisable for the first year or so due to the building work going on in the area.  Long term rental for 'spanish residents' would be the better way forward (11 months)

Any comments? - Keri & Hugh

I have bought with Mri and they never mentioned this but we have bought and at present do not know which way to go with rental

understand what they say but what is being built so near that you could not rent it out?

we were also promised phase2 finished march and we have been officially told september now

thanks   lynda

I purchased in May 2005 with MRI and it was never mentioned about not renting in the first year, in fact we were told, and it is in our rentals pack in writing, to expect 12 to 15 weeks rentals the first year!

Dont want to sound despondant but a lot of what MRI said at the time of us agreeing to buy doesn't seam to be materialising.

e.g. we were told interest rates would not be rising in the next 12 months! they have gone up 1.25% since we bought and may rise more before completion.

Also found out about the delays from other sources not MRI.

Dont know if i will be joining aftersales the second year unless things improve.

Regards.

We had a slow start with MRI aftersales but if you e-mail them with questions, they usually answer.  We were in contact with them because we had not heard from the solicitor and MRI then seemed to be doing all they could to resolve our query.  We were even having phone calls from headoffice to make sure we were okay etc. 

We have now had telephone calls from them to say who we have to contact if we have any questions - Hugh will check in work tomorrow.

When we wanted to know how Porto Fino was getting on, aftersales sent us some photographs so they have been helpful when approached.

The Aftersales rep, whilst on the phone the other day told Hugh that she would be looking for long term rental for Thalasa for a couple of years due to the building work still going on in the area and whether people would want to holiday there.  That would probably be up to us as the owners though and whether we took a chance on getting enough private rentals I suppose - it is a chance we may all have to take.   

We were told completion July/August but it would be September by the time all the paperwork etc could be sorted because there are so many properties.

We own on Al Andalus Hills, but only completed in the summer.  We have since then rented out for 3 weeks to different families.  Each enjoyed their stay and one has rebooked.  I think warning any potential guests that they need a car and there is building is important.  Centro Hispania opening with shops/restaurants gives another facility which is important.  I think that not all guests are so worried about building.  One of ours found it absolutely facinating and his wife kept getting annoyed that he didn't want to go out, just wander around the site and view the work (but he is, apparently, in the building trade anyway).  Our first re-bookers liked the idea the apartment was so new and clean . . .mmm lets hope it still is next year!  Having said all that, August was fairly quiet as it was too hot to build and I understand that Easter can also be due to the staggered national/regional holidays.