THE Junta de Andalucia is set to demolish two more British-owned homes in Cantoria, Almeria.

Two houses in the village of Las Terrenas have already been demolished and the town’s former mayor arrested for lying about his involvement with the properties.

The two detached houses were judged to have been built on undeveloped land without the required paperwork.

The former mayor Pedro Llamas is currently serving a two year prison sentence for lying about authorising water and electricity supplies to the four properties.

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119 COMMENTS

  2. Gus, lots of work has been done. The issue has been raised at the EU Parliament several times. You must now know the extent of Spanish corruption at all levels. No one can sort it out even the Spanish, that is why they are looking at Podemos. Your posts are sounding silly now, just trying to dilute the topic.

    Why do you think regularising gives the same effect?? Would you be happy if the house you had paid over €150,000 for to be told well, you can live in it but only until you die. At the same time it is Unsellable except for the price of a moto.

  4. Yes Marion, that’s working from the top, which has to be done.

    But the root problem is with the individual selfish culture, which is what drives the promoters, etc to con people. That can only be changed by showing that the overall costs are higher than any immediate monetary benefit they can get. Criminalise them and affect their future business and all associated with them and they will stop. The criminalisation needs a change in the law, which comes from the top. The best way to affect future business is to blacken the individual’s reputation. And for that, the whole world needs to know what they’ve done and who with. List the people involved with the ‘permissions’, promotion, construction, marketing and sale of each property that is demolished for being illegal or scheduled for such.

    Or can you all just not be bothered?

  6. No Gus, it is not that we cannot be bothered, WE DO NOT AGREE WITH YOU, that is not the same thing. How many more times, these people just want the law changed – which only the Junta de Andalucia can do – so that they can legalise their houses once and for all and then get on with their lives.

    Stop banging on about your two-tier system idea of only regularising these properties – it’s crap and we are not interested.

    Criminalising all these people you list is someone else’s job, not ours, we just want the properties legalised.

    GET IT.

  8. Jane. Now I do. You want a complete amnesty so that all illegal properties are legalised, and the people who made money out of you and gave you all that grief should just walk away to do it again to somebody else. You have no interest in stopping it happening to others, as long as Jane is OK. Well, now we know.

    Bryan, the video is in the title of this feature and also in the comments above. Wake up.

    You’re all not worth the effort.

  10. I think most of us rumbled him with his first 2 posts. He tried to change tack but he is one of those typical expats who cannot stand any criticism of Spain, it would burst their rose tinted balloon and they would come crashing down to earth.

    I had a quick look at the Spanish expat forums and only a couple have actually mentioned the demolitions, like don’t talk about the war. Lenox did have a try on one forum but it was ignored. Perhaps Gus should join them?.?
    They can’t bury bad news it has gone viral on Facebook.

  11. Gus, how do you manage it, you are wrong yet again. I do NOT have a so called “illegal” property in Spain, my property is as legal as any property in Spain can be but the Junta could move the goal posts yet again and change the law at any time – no property is completely safe in Spain.

    But this is not about me. I joined SOHA to support the people who are affected by this dreadful situation and how sad that you think people only campaign about things that directly affect them.

    Yes, I do want an amnesty but as I have said on here a hundred times before “the Junta de Andalucia must change the law, legalise the affected properties and then make sure the law is properly enforced thereafter”. That does not suggest that I want this to happen to other people in the future does it? You and the Junta have a lot in common, you keep scoring own goals.

    Bryan, you are right, some people are very insecure and can’t get through the day without being pumped up by some kind of mutual appreciation society. Well tough, much as we would like it to, this problem is not going away and neither are AUAN or SOHA until it does.

  12. Again why doesn’t Jane Fred and the other great complaining brains do something about this problem.
    I think that Olive Press are doing their part in an exellent way but what are the anti Spain panel doing? Gus why do you bother to try to educate this lot?
    They seems to belive anything they read like the story of a stoned dog with a Swedish owner who do not speak Swedish. Lol.

  13. Thanks kb for restoring my faith that there are practical people out there.

    Jane, we both want the same thing, but an amnesty was tried before, all was legalised, but individuals took that as proof of weakness and started the whole thing again causing the mess we have now. Legalise it all and it will just start again. The people that gained out of these illegal works need to be penalised in such a way that it costs them more than they’ve gained. Also there are many owners who knew of the illegality, but just went ahead despite that. Both self-builders and buyers who were warned. Unfortunately they believed the mantra that ‘it’ll be OK, factor a fine into the costs and carry on.’ Well, late or not, that can’t be allowed to happen. As I’ve been banging on about to ‘deaf ears’ here its penalising the perpetrators of these works that gets justice done AND their example stops it happening in the future.

  15. instead of knocking down the houses why don`t the Spanish give them to their own people. My house in Alhaurin has been given to a Spanish family, I have had no notification from the bank, it was rented out for five years, with “cam bank” taking the money. still that’s spain!.

  16. Irene: Surely your house was a “snatch-back” for mortgage default? The ones being demolished are deemed to be “illegal”.
    Even Spain wouldn’t have the nerve to re-house one of their own in one of those. It isn’t Israel. Yet.

  17. did the notary take money for the “illegal”,builds, as they have in the Costa Del Sol, then surely with the monies going to the Spanish Government they have taken money under false pretences!
    In my case the way “Cam bank” or its new partner have carried out this “snatch back” is illegal, as you cannot go to Court to defend yourself.
    I would never advise any Brit to go to live in Spain as they only look after their own. I do have personal experience of a local government officer saying it to my Solicitor and myself, stating The British are not going to make money out of us, in Spanish not realising I understood what he said.

  18. Irene, yes the notaries did take money from the transactions of these so called “illegal” properties and as I have said on here before, the whole thing was a fit up from start to finish and the Junta de Andalucia, who are to blame for these demolitions, knew exactly what was going on right from the start.

    As Stefanjo says, even the Spanish would not have the front to turf Brits out of their houses and put their own people in them. The properties in this particular case were not repossessed and owned by the bank, they were still owned by the victims – now they have been demolished, they just own the land.

    Your local government official was right, British people do not make any money out of Spain but Spain makes plenty of money out of the British people who invest in their country.

  19. People need to understand that property in Spain is one gigantic trap. It is loaded against you and the system just wants to repeat the cycle of luring in expats to keep paying 10% purchase fees, ad infinitum. One you have bought a place, you get crap service, inefficiency on every level, and corrupt practices. Once you need help you’re on your own.

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