Spain: Spanish Real Estate Legal Update

The new Land Act came into force on 1st July 2007 last, replacing the former Land System and Valuations Act 6/1998, 13th April.
Its purpose is to:
* Preserve landscape and environmental character
* Curb property speculation and rising house prices
* Stop excessive development.
This Act will regulate the basic conditions guaranteeing equality in the exercise of and compliance with land-related Constitutional rights and duties throughout the territory of Spain. Similarly, the new law provides for the economic and environmental basis underpinning the legal framework of land, land valuation and the Public Administrations’ patrimonial liability in this matter.

Sonae Sierra develops shopping centre in Spain with IKEA

Sonae Sierra, the real estate unit of conglomerate Sonae SGPS, is developing a shopping centre project with Sweden's furniture group IKEA in Granada, southern Spain, Diario Economico reported, citing Sonae Sierra CEO Alvaro Portela. Sonae Sierra owns 46 shopping centres in Portugal, Spain, Italy, Germany, Greece, Romania and Brazil, with a gross leasable area of over 1.7 mln square metres, which registered 402 mln visitors in 2006. The company is currently developing 13 new projects in Portugal, Spain, Germany, Greece and Brazil.

Property group set to be first Spanish victim

A Spanish property developer feted for its astute management and aggressive marketing is likely to become Spain's first high-profile victim of the credit squeeze affecting much of the world's financial system. Llanera, which develops holiday homes around the Mediterranean city of Valencia, is locked in talks with creditors on restructuring about €300m ($420m, £210m) in debt. Under normal circumstances, it might have been thrown a lifeline by its banks to stave off bankruptcy.

Housing Market Slump `Unthinkable' in Spain

ept. 18 (Bloomberg) -- A residential real estate slump in Spain, where prices have almost tripled since 1997, is ``unthinkable,'' the top economic adviser of Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said.
The solvency of the banking system and of real estate developers, as well as the unmet demand for new homes, will prevent any meaningful price erosion, David Taguas, head of the prime minister's economic research unit, said in an interview yesterday at his office at the presidential palace in Madrid.

Montenegro property market 'poised'

Montenegro is set to become one of the most attractive investment opportunities in the global property market, according to a real estate specialist. Pelle Langli, CEO of Emerging Real Estate, said that the market in Montenegro will echo the investment opportunities experienced in neighbouring Croatia. He commented: "In places like Portugal, Italy and Spain the prices have just raced away. We have huge expectations when it comes to Montenegro and Cape Verde.

Crisis in the markets could be beneficial in the long term

The Spanish Stock Market has been affected by the poor employment data from the United States, which appears to have reactivated the feelings of a financial crisis.
The index ended last week below the 13,900 level, following other European bourses south. The Banking sector was hardest hit.
Falls have been continuing in trading today in what were mixed moves across Europe.
Meanwhile ex Federal Reserve chief, Alan Greenspan, has compared the current crisis to that seen in 1987 and 1998.

Spain offers property bargains away from the Costas

With prices in key Spanish resorts reaching record levels many investors are looking to other regions to find new investment opportunities. A leading Spanish real estate believes that moving away from the traditional holiday areas of the Costa del Sol in Spain could give investors much more choice and value for money in the short and long-term, especially as holidaymakers are more willing to venture to new resorts.
Brad Johnston, an estate agent specialising in the Spanish property market, explained: "If you're looking towards the Costa Blanca area, and further around the coast line you would certainly get more value for your money."

Searching for Spanish property

kyero.com is the largest English language Spanish property portal listing over 90,000 properties from 700 agents across Spain. Its aim is to connect buyers and sellers of Spanish property and uploads on average 400 new properties each day. As Kyero.com is not a selling agent the portal is truly independent giving potential buyers access to unbiased and accurate information on the Spanish property market through the quarterly Spanish House Price Index available to download free of charge.

Real estate agencies fall victim to slump in property market

Anyone with a property for sale will tell you: houses are taking much longer to sell. There is a lot of choice but prices are still way above the limits of most budgets and buyers are taking months to make their minds up. For numerous real estate firms the situation has ended up getting the better of them and agencies all over the province of Malaga are closing down. If fact now, two years after the end of the boom, there are 40 per cent fewer real estate agencies open in the province.There are plenty of factors causing the industry problems, the main one being the saturation of the market.

Marbella tries to clean up its act

Marbella has long been a favourite spot for Britons to settle and enjoy their twilight years slowly roasting in the Mediterranean sun. It has been unkindly called "the Spanish Bourne-mouth". So it was first feared the latest scandal would mean some 5,000 homes in Marbella, many owned by Britons, would be bulldozed as they were built with illegal licences or none at all. But the new city council and many of the developers and building companies implicated in the web of corruption struck a deal, which has granted a reprieve to thousands of worried property owners. Now under the new administration, a development plan is to grant a reprieve to the owners of all but 752 homes.