hi

our mortgage company  has   failed    three times in the last two months  to get into our apartment to value it . this is the second  valueation as due to the delay the first mortgage ran out after three months .

 i phoned the site office  spoke to nuria     and was told no one can go in untill the licence they are waiting for from the council  is granted  .we had no problem last january when the first valuation  was done and they have had people in to clean apartments so i myself cant see what the problem is . or are we being fob off   is anyone else having  this problem

and can someone give me a phone number of head office to see if i can sort it out .  .the site office just dont want to know we are phase 4 block 2 and all the work is done  i dont understand  this .   unless they are hoping we will pull out and they can resell at a profit       well we are fed up playing the waiting game its now time to bring in our legal team and issue a claim  they have  lied  to  us   taken our money broken terms of contrac  we do not intend to pull out  but will take court proceedings for mall practice 

Hi,

I fully understand your frustration but I think that this might be explained by the fact that in the past banks in Spain were lax in granting mortgages for properties that don't yet have the habitation license. Banks are now more strict in complying with the law which prohibits the grant of mortgages in the absence of a habitation license and it appears that the sales dept. in Arenal is sensitive to that too. I guess that this state of mind started following the Marbella scandal where official were alleged to have granted construction permits illegaly. Now if there are issues with the habitation permit in your phase or block at Arenal, you need to inquire and know the full details as it is not in your interest to take on a mortgage and close on the sale of your flat in the absence of a habitation permit. I understand that buyers are entitled to refuse to close on the sale if the habitation permit is not yet available but maybe someone can elaborate more on that point..

Cheers,

Lweld

I'm sure Iweld is right . Our solicitor has been quite clear that as yet there is no habitation licence and that this will ot be granted until the town hall receives a positive report re the drainage problem. Once the habitation licence is granted we will then be given a four week window in which to put our financial arrangements in place. Valuations will then be allowed to take place prior to mortgages being granted. Before we are notified re this four week period we are still able to withdraw from the sale. Once we are notified, however ,we are bound to the contract.

A lot of the problems we are having re communication seem to result from the way in which some employees in the Sales Office deal with our enquiries. This may result from cultural and/or language difficulties or it may be the result of a lack of customer service skills on their part.  Who can say. I know how frustrating it is and have blown my top on more than one occasion at what seems to be the overall lack of progress, however ,since living over here permanently we have met a number of couples who have waited for considerably longer than a year past the promised completion date to eventually move into their property.

Jenny

iweld

i understand what you are saying but i dont think this is the problem in this case  As we had the apartment valued last january and our mortgage was granted without the F.L.O in place .  but a spanish mortgage offer  is for three months once you accept

   if you dont complete in this time frame   the offer   is withdrawn and with the delays  this happend to us   We now have applied   for the second time  so we have had to pay a futher valueation fee    The mortgage  has been  granted  subject to a valuation the only problem our mortgage company has tried three  time in the last four week to value our apartmant but each time were not allowed in  

  Today we again phoned soraya at site office  five times but she was to busy to speak to us  or so we were told.   So we phoned head office in cordoba spoke to gonzalas who did not understand  why  the mortgage company were not addmited . he is looking into it and will phone us back later today.

And as for the licence they must have them as we  were called over to spain end of july by our solicitor to sign final contract  but when we arrived  at the meeting he told us it had been delayed as there were problems  we asked if it was the licence  he  told us  the licence  was there  the problem was elextrics in phase four.                  Once they sorted that out  we could go ahead  but then as you know they had a leak in water main  but i think this also has been sorted out .

We were also told  not everyone will sign together its a case of first to buy is first in unless you keep complaining

Got it, thanks. Keep the pressure up...just make sure the license is there before you sign the mortgage papers, you don't want to be paying monthly installement on a flat that you can't occupy. Take care.