We have been living in Spain since August 2007 and are currently renting an apartment in Los Granados, Duquesa so we are only a 10 minute drive from Hacienda Casares.
My husband went to see the 'complex' last week and in his opinion there is nothing 'complex' about it! 600 odd apartments on top of a mountain is how he describes it . There are no facilities whatsoever. No greenery, no nothing and no plans at all in the pipline for any thing that was promised by Aifos. As it stands at the moment these properties are unsaleable and unusable. This is not pessimism, this is reality. With a completely finished development we belive it is a sound investment but not good. The question is who, when , if and how it is to be completed. The sensible thing to do if you have not already done so is to contact your lawyer and refuse to pay another euro until everything has been completed as per the facilties Aifos promised would be available. In this dire sitiaution there is only strength in numbers and false optimism is not an option. This is Spain! Remember all Aifos want is your money and after that your'e on your own. Residents or action committees are all well and good to get things moving but this requires time, total committment, communication and money.
We have come to realise that when it comes to purchasing off plan property in Spain promises, assurances and guarantees from banks and developers are based on a 'manyana' syndrome! That doesn't mean tomorrow, it means not today.
This is in our opinion the reality of the sitiaution and anyone reading this should think very seriously before handing over any more of your hard earned cash. Throwing good money after bad comes to mind!
On a more positive note the following is an article from this weeks Sur in English which may give us a way out if you do not want to go ahead and complete on your properties as it seems that Spanish judges are siding with disguntled Aifos buyers. This is the course of action we will be taking!! I personally wish I had never heard of the damned place. We have been contacted by our lawyer to say that our apartment in Pensamiento is ready for snagging but I personally have not been anywhere near the development since we moved out here, have completely lost all interest and have no intention of going to snag an apartment that I have no intention of competing the purchase of.
Aifos in court
The Malaga courts are currently dealing with more than 200 cases brought against the developers Aifos for failing to hand over new properties to their owners within the time limit established in their contracts. Some of these cases have already been to court and have resulted in the company being ordered to give its customers their money back, plus interest, sums which in some cases have amounted to as much as 329,000 euros. Furthermore some courts have gone even further and sentenced the defendant to paying compensation for the moral damage caused to the buyers, on the grounds that they have undergone “a situation of anguish and impotence”, according to the words of one sentence. A lawyer of the firm CYC Asesores, which represents many of the buyers taking legal action against Aifos, especially in Fuengirola, Malaga and Rincón de la Victoria, maintains that Aifos owns “significant” assets and that the developers continued to call on clients to sign their title deeds even “after properties had been declared illegal”. Meanwhile José Ramón Gutiérrez of the firm Lawbird Legal Services points out that in a number of cases the courts have frozen some of the firm’s assets to ensure that clients get their money.
Jan Hills