A WEALTHY family is squatting in an Albacete property that they are using as their ‘second home’ – they have even started renovating it to their liking.
Owning a Mercedes and Ford Mondeo with children who ride around on electric scooters, the family are renovating the house that they are illegally occupying.
The home’s owner, Manuel, is at wits’ end: he received a call from one of his Albacete neighbours about these squatters on March 7 and they are still occupying the property today.
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This initial call came at a time when the chalet, which is intended to be rented out by third parties, had no one living in it.
On the day he received the call Manuel travelled two hours by car from his Valencia home to Albacete with his sister – upon arrival he found five Policia Municipal officers telling the mother to leave the house, which she refused to do.
Later Manuel learnt that some workers from the telephone company Orange were at the house because the squatters were installing fibre optic into his home, Manuel told OKDIARIO.
The occupiers were also doing construction work on the front of the house – ‘they want to renovate because they had thought they would stay there for a while,’ says Manuel.
Having changed the house’s entrance and destroyed and rebuilt columns in the garden, the family are continuing to make changes.
Towards the middle of March Manuel discovered through the Iberdrola app that the property’s electricity consumption had skyrocketed.
The family had tampered with the meter causing the company to demand payment for the illegal connection – they are saying that it is Manuel’s responsibility to collect the 1,680 charge from the squatters.
Later Manuel received a notification from Iberdrola confirming a ‘change in ownership in electricity supply’.
The squatters had canceled Manuel’s contract, put the account in their name and increased their power.
They have repeatedly done this and, in total, since March the home has seen 17 contracts with the occupiers taking out seven and cancelling ten of Manuel’s.
These contracts have been made with numerous companies who not once asked the squatters for a rental contract nor property owners details.
As contract chaos persisted, the family occupying the home installed a generator that ‘works day and night’ – it was this installation that provoked protests from neighbours.
‘You can see the satellites and an antenna there,’ says Manuel.
The family have their own property close to the Fray y Luis de Leon square with the mother being considered a ‘vulnerable person’.
It was confirmed to OKDIARIO that the parents of the squatting family legally separated so that the wife could receive social assistance as a single mother.
Neighbours, however, say that she is neither a single mother nor separated from her partner.
Despite winning a lawsuit against his squatters and a judge finding the occupiers guilty, Manuel is still waiting to recover his property.
The situation has caused him great financial hardship because he has had to cover his own expenses, the basic utility costs of his occupied home, and lawyer’s fees.
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This madness has to end.
Is this a result of the Spanish law that says if a squatter manages to live undisturbed in a (temporarily) vacant home for 3 days, it becomes theirs?
Hi Roslyn
It doesn’t become theirs, but after three days, it is much harder to get rid of them, and you have to go through the court route.
Before 72 hours, you can still get them out that week and with the police. At least that’s what I understand.
It depends a little bit on the area and the local Townhall, courts and police force, but it normally takes a few months, but sometimes years to get rid of squatters in Spain.
In fact, it’s a major problem and it would be one that I would look to solve immediately if I was the country’s president.