New Forum Member

Just wanted to say hello to all members of the LTDLT forums and to let you know I became a member today.

My wife and I are in the very early stages of purchasing an apartment on Phase 1 - Block 57

Only arrived back to the UK on Wednesday after spending a few days over in Spain getting the ball rolling.

Any forum tips would be greafully received. I must say, I am finding "Eye on Spain" somewhat difficult to navigate as a first time user, but am sure I will get the hang of it.

Really like TDLT Golf Resort and was impressed with the ongoing upkeep there. Was hoping for any tips/advice with regards to what to expect on TDLT for future reference when hopefully we complete.

Anyway, just wanted to say hello to you all by way of a short introduction.

Regards, Del & Max

I am also a new member we have just completed today .we have just bought in phase 1 block 48 Paul and Laura 

Welcome to Las Terrazas de la Torre Paul & Laura and Del & Max.

We completed in March and have been out four times since: Easter, April/May, June/July and August/September. We love it and can't wait to get back out there at every opportunity.

The weather is fantastic all year round, and the resort is well looked after with the apartments in Phase 1 built around the communal pools in "horseshoes" with views over the golf course. The pools never seem busy and the resort is always tranquil. It does get a little busy in July/August, but not overly crowded or noisy.

Food and drink are very cheap in the local supermarkets with lots of local fruit and vegetables and of course local wine at fantastic value. Within the community there is the Saurines Clubhouse which has a restaurant and bar and also a Spar supermarket. The Saurines golf course is kept to a very high standard and is well used without being crowded. There are some good restaurants in the surrounding areas of Roldan and Balsicas.

You probably know we are pretty central for all the local attractions. 15 minutes from San Javier airport. 15 minutes to the beaches at Mar Menor. 25 minutes to the cities of Cartagena and Murcia, 30 minutes to the mountainous El Valle and Carrascoy Regional Park. There are also lots of local markets and attractions. There is good snorkelling and diving around Cabo de Palos and Mazzaron both about 40 minutes drive away.

There are also numerous water sports on the Mar Menor such as dinghy sailing, windsurfing, kayaking and kite boarding. There are a number of large shopping malls for example Zenia boulevard is a 20 minute drive away and has a large Al Campo hypermarket together with shops like Zara, Mango, Decathlon, Leroy Merlin, Zara Home. Espacio Mediterraneo is 25 minutes away and has a large Carrefour hypermarket together with a similar array of shops, restaurants and coffee shops.

Del & Max, we will be neighbours as we are in Block 56. Paul & Laura, we are opposite you across the same "horseshoe".

No doubt we'll see you all round the pool or in the clubhouse at some point in the future.

Hello Duncan, thank you for the welcome and details you provided. Yes, neighbours indeed. Hello to Paul & Laura too.

Duncan, I noticed you say that you completed in March. Can I ask if you had any issues once electricy and water were turned on. I am asking as I assume your property hadn't been lived in before hand. Were there any issues with leaking pipes for example, or any electrical issues worthy of note.

Thanks in advance.

The only issue that I had was a minor leak from the toilet cistern. Basically one of the plastic nylon sealing washers had been screwed down too tight and cracked. A local plumber came out, found the problem and fixed it for me for €25.

Everything else was in perfect working order.

Hello Del and Max and also Paul and Laura.  We are Steve and Judy and we completed on our purchase in September and are opposite you on Phase 2.  Welcome to your home from home.  If you have a look at my posts I have asked questions about everything - I'm the pessimist where Steve is the jump in both feet first optimist!  We have been over twice since buying and are going out again in a few weeks.  Any regrets?  Absolutely none.  It's fabulous.

You will also find that everyone is extremely friendly and knowledgeable both on this site and in person and where they have trodden the path before you, are more than happy to pass on all the information to ensure you miss the potholes.

Security is so good on the development that neighbours who took photos of our apartment for us while they finished building it were often asked to remove themselves even though they owned property lol

Duncan, who we have yet to meet, must have a line up of pints on the bar waiting for him to claim as he is a walking encyclopaedia when it comes to information on anything from days out, restaurants,  electricity and water deals, Internet, furniture stores.........the list goes on and he has saved us a pretty penny by taking his advice.  Henry I'm sure will contact you and is also a wealth of information.  

As Duncan says the development is quiet, beautifully kept and watching the golfers from the terrace while having breakfast is so relaxing.

There is an Indian restaurant on the outskirts of the development which I'm sure someone else will be able to tell you the name of which is gorgeous and the staff are really welcoming.

One thing we are bringing with us next time is the satnav!  Trying to find places for us wasn't as easy as we first thought 😡

Hope you enjoy every minute. We certainly have.

Forgot to add, one of the highlights of the Spar supermarket is that the bread is baked onsite. There is usually a queue that forms at baking time to collect the freshly baked bread. It's not an overly long queue and worth it for that hot freshly baked bread for breakfast 

It took us a number of visits to discover this because we were never up in time!

The other thing I forgot to mention was that on Del & Max's side, the sun won't be on your terrace until mid morning. No breakfast on the terrace in the sun unless you are late risers like us. You can however enjoy your evening meal on the terrace in the sun with a nice glass of local wine.

Paul & Laura will be the opposite, breakfast in the sun but no late evening rays.

Having said that, there is always the roof terrace or gardens to enjoy the sunshine all day long

Hi all.  We are hoping to come over to pick up our keys middle to end of January. we plan to rent an apartment on terrazzas  whilst we clean through ours and do some research regarding furnishing our apartment. Any tips or advise will be appreciated ie furniture package, buy from Spain or from uk ?  Also does everyone use a key holder ?  Will be nice to meet some of you if anyone is around at this time. Paul and Laura.

We rented an apartment to stay in for the same reason.  Will happily pass on th details.

We are over for a couple of days at the beginning of February?

As for furniture, Duncan sent me in the direction of a company whose details I will happily pass on.  He suggested there rather than DFS as they were cheaper for the same goods and we saved lots!  As a bonus the lady we dealt with was English and patiently stuck with me while I changed my mind about the lighting a million times.  muebles@muebleshermanosnavarro.com ask for Mandy and remember to haggle!

Then you have IKEA and also LeeRoy Merlin to get all the bits and pieces and we have also been told to look for the Chinese shops that sell everything the nearest being in Roldan but we have t been in there so can't say what they are like.

White goods we got from Tien21 in Roldan and again you can haggle with them too lol

We learnt all this information from other owners on the development and have to be honest they pointed us in the right direction.  Our problem was without th SatNav it took a couple of tries at finding them.

Hello Steve & Judy, thank you for the kind welcome and information provided. Yes, the knowledge of others already settled in will be invaluable. There seems to be a lot of new home from home owners who have just/recently/in process of completed/completing. 

Thanks very much for the tips. We will definitely try at haggling if it worked for you! Laura and Paul.

Duncan, that was a good result with just a minor leak to contend with. I hope for a similar outcome. Evening meals on the terrace in the sunshine appeals too. Freshly made bread each morning, very nice and sounds worth the bit of queueing involved.

I don't recall seeing any roof terrace while viewing. Do all blocks have one? I also wondered how many phases were on the development as I have seen quoted on the forums phase 12 - are there 12/more than 12 phases?

All information is very much appreciated, so thank you for that. Steve & Judy too, thank you.

The two companies that I was recommended for furniture packages were.

Muebles Hermanos Mavarro - based near mar menor golf resort. Not a great website, but their packages were decent value although seem to have gone up in price over the last year. If you contact Mandy, she will be able to send their latest packages in English.

DFS Furniture Spain - this used to be www.dfsspain.com but now redirects here. Looks like they have done some sort of partnership deal with DFS UK and are now selling DFS furniture in Spain. I can't see the furnitue packs they used to do on their website, but their web site used to look like this.

These companies aren't as cheap as if you sourced everything from the likes of IKEA but they do supply and fit everything you need from lighting to white goods, from sofas to dining table and chairs, from bathroom fittings to patio furniture and will deliver and fit everything without you needing to be there. All included in the price.

If you want to do it all yourself, there are a few of the chinese supermarkets in Los Alcazares. Fairly cheap but also a lot of low quality goods in there. We bought a barbecue that quickly rusted. Yes, I know, how much rain do we get on Las Terrazas and it still rusted.... We also bought pillows there that were very poor. The big hypermarkets like Carrefour and Al Campo will give you all you need with respect to household goods and electrical items at good prices. IKEA in Murcia for furniture etc.

Yes DelandMax, all apartment blocks on Phase 1 have a communal roof terrace. Some are larger than others.

You can see yours here. The red area is the terrace. The grey areas are pebbles. The white areas are walls. The white wall in the middle of the terrace is the drying area. There are beams that run either side of that wall and drying ropes between them. The air conditioning units sit between the wall and the pebbles.

There were meant to be 14 phases. You can see a map here

Phases 1, 2 (by far the biggest two phases), 5 and 12 have been built although there are still 3 blocks on Phase 2 under construction (the new blue and white ones). Not sure how many apartments were originally planned but there are currently over 1,500 completed and around 800 in private ownership. As of July, the banks owned around 500 properties and Polaris World around 250. These numbers have likely changed now as there have been quite a lot of sales this year.

Feel free to PM me with any questions you have.

paulpins, tried to send you a pm re rental properties and a keyholder, but it says your email address is invalid.

Well that's strange!  I will message him

Hi all, I was hoping for a bit of advise .I'm coming over in January for an inspection trip and expecting the hard sell but i was liking the look of the 2 bed apartments at the Terraza de la Torre that seem at a reasonable price.This would be my first time buying abroad and as you would expect i'm a little tentative.I'm doing as much reasearch as i can and come across this useful forum and read your comments which seem positive.So if you have any advice tips you could share then it would be truly appreciated 

Are the community fees reasonable? Is it a building site in areas as I have read that their are unfinished phases?Does the golf course get busy in the summer and when roughly does the season run to as it still seems pretty warm in the winter months? Are the restaurants at Roldan within walking distance of under 25/30 mins

Thanks in advance

John 

Hi John,

I think the community fees are very reasonable for what we get. I have an apartment in Manchester and also one on Las Terrazas. The community fees in my Manchester apartment are more than twice those on Las Terrazas. The gardens are bigger in Las Terrazas, there is a pool and 24x7 security. Having said that, there are other communities in Murcia where the fees are less, as well as some where they are higher. I've made a couple of posts on another site which covers the purchase costs and ongoing running costs of my 2 bed apartment in Las Terrazas. Happy to share.

I have been to Las Terrazas 5 times in the last year. December 2014, Easter 2015, Apr/May, June/July and Aug/Sep. It is fair to say it is quiet from November-February, starts to get busier around Easter, peak season is July/August and still fairly busy September/October. I have a weather station installed which has captured the temperatures, rainfall, wind etc since May. Again, happy to share.

Not sure which estate agent you are going with, but we went via La Vida Spain and it was nothing like a hard sell. Joaquin showed us round a number of apartments on a number of different days and couldn't have been more laid back.

Not all the apartments originally planned have been bult, however there are over 1500 properties on the golf resort. I'm not sure how many were originally planned but I would guess just under a half have been built. It is certainly not a building site. The apartments are set in mature, well maintained gardens with communal pools. There are three blocks under construction, one is receiving the final touches, one is having the walls built, the third is a shell i.e. only main infrastructure in place. Building work is not obtrusive.

The golf course is in excellent condition and well used but not busy enough to cause slow play or queues waiting on tees. The clubhouse is open all year round and the golf course is used throughout the year. Weather is perfect all year round but probably better to get an early or late tee time in high season as it can get very hot!

There is a restaurant, bar and supermarket onsite. The nearest restaurants are just under 2 miles away towards Balsicas and just over 2 miles in Roldan, so you could walk it in about half an hour, but it is a bit hot to be walking at 4mph pace in summer, but January will probably be OK. La Torre Golf Resort is a similar distance.

Thanks Duncan for taking the time to reply, your comments are very useful. I'm doing the inspection trip with blue med invest and expect to be quite busy getting to see a number of properties. I am coming from North Wales so I'm hoping a for 5-6 trips a year relaxing in the sun,peace and quiet and a few games of golf with a choice of few restaurants within a short drive so I,m hoping this is the place unlike wet and windy Wales.

Once again thanks

Take care

John

Hi John,

we went with Golf Propty Store Andy and Catherine.  Because of an injury they found us what we were looking for while we were in England sitting on the sofa.  We wrote down a wish list and sent it to them.  They called us back with a "bargain" and being the pessimist I was very reluctant to commit us to anything before seeing it, although it sounded fabulous and other members on this site were more than happy to take photos and tell us that what we were being offered was a diamond of a purchase.  We were also told it was under value as the previous purchaser had pulled out.  That worried me more.  Mr is the optimist and without me knowing put the deposit down and the flights were booked and i fretted the whole time.

What we got was what we were promised and what the neighbours described as a bargain and they were all right and we couldnt be happier.  It is everything we wanted and more.  All the agents get commission for taking you to furniture shops if you purchase while you are there so we went with Duncan's recommendation and saved a fortune.  We have also followed suit when it comes to gas, electric and Internet charges and other members on the site for air con.

Where  are we.......La Terrazas De La Torre, a few minutes drive to a decent supermarket, cycling or driving distance to restaurants, surrounded by agricultural fields so no road noise, short drive to the beach.  It's fabulous.

We are on phase 2 so don't have to worry about bits and pieces going wrong as the builders are happy to sort things out.  I understand phase 1, or the ones owned by the banks are cheaper but you are on your own if things go wrong.

i wouldn't have minded either phase but as ours has a walk in shower it saved a lot of problems while I am injured and was another ticked box.

flights from Stansted to Murcia are Ryanair and as soon as the flights are released six months in advance we book them so it looks like we are going out six times so far next year including the long weekends.

absolutely perfect.