[Article] Expat sun dreams are wrecked by Spanish land grabs

Victor

http://www.sbpost.ie/web/DocumentView/did-958383919-pageUrl--2FThe-Newspaper-2FSundays-Paper-2FNews.asp

Expat sun dreams are wrecked by Spanish land grabs
12/09/04 00:00
By Susan Mitchell

When Irishwoman Ann Ringland bought a rural property three years ago in the foothills of the Sierra de Albatera in Alicante, Spain, she was looking forward to a quiet life in retirement.

The nightmare began this year, when her one-acre plot and those of 370 other local property owners were reclassified as urbanisables - meaning that Ringland's idyllic rural haven is about to be transformed into a concrete jungle.

``Under the existing land laws I will have to donate up to 65 per cent of my land to the developer. I will get no compensation whatsoever. It is legal robbery. It really is beyond belief,'' she said.

Ringland and the other property owners affected estimate that they will have to pay up to €120,000 for the infrastructure changes to accommodate the new housing.

``If we don't have the money, they say they will take more land, which effectively means losing our homes,'' she said.

Ringland's plight - and that of thousands of property-owners in Spain - stems from regional urbanisation laws first applied in the autonomous region of Valencia that have spread throughout Spain.

The laws were drawn up 10 years ago to fight speculators who were blocking urban development by sitting on land around coastal towns.

Town halls are allowed to approve urbanisation plans without the consent or knowledge of the property-owners affected by these plans. The law decrees that if a rural area is rezoned for building, the authorities can demand up to 70 per cent of the land free - or, in some cases, pay a small percentage of the market value.

Under the legislation, property developers owning more than 50 per cent of land in a given area can force homeowners to sell them the actual land around their flats or houses, and then force those owners to contribute to costs of the infrastructure development which follows.

Over the past four years some enterprising developers in collusion with local councils began taking over privately-owned plots at far below the market value. Homeowners have been forced to hand over their land - and in some cases pay for the privilege.

Recently widowed Joan O'Dwyer from Dublin fell victim to what has been dubbed the biggest illegal land grab in Europe since World War II.

``I have a country house in a rural area called Polop, outside Benidorm, in Valencia. I'm unfortunate - but not as unfortunate as other people I see around me.

"I was told that 50 per cent of my land - about three-quarters of an acre - will be handed over to the town hall. I also have to pay about €180,000 towards the cost of new infrastructure,'' said O'Dwyer.

Since the scandal broke, 10,000 home owners - both expatriates and Spanish people - have banded together to form Abusos Urbanisticos - NO! It is headed by Charles Svoboda, a former director general of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.

It was at his request, backed by amass petition, that the EU sent a delegation of Mopes to investigate land law abuses earlier this year. It has just issued a damning report, which includes detailed case histories exposing bribery, corruption and malpractice.

Svoboda said the report represented an important blueprint for future court actions at the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights. ``Thousands of homes and millions of euro are at stake,'' he said.

The government in Valencia has presented a draft of changes to the law, but Svoboda and the European Parliament report have said that it does not go far enough.

Last year, 190,000 newly built holiday homes were sold in Spain. Half of the sales were to foreigners, who spent a record €7.2 billion on their Spanish properties, according to the Bank of Spain.

martarg

That is strange... I'd never heard that one had to pay the developer for turning rural properties into urban ones, unless perhaps the developer is the city hall, people do get land expropriated (with a little money in return) to be turned to communal use... usually around here that sort of change is regarded as a good thing. It means the value of your property is multiplied, so perhaps those proprietors can still make a profit and buy elsewhere.... I would suggest southern Galicia :cool: ... Sunny summers, green fields, wonderful food, and much less speculation....

ChipZilla

Yeah, there was a thing about this on Channel 4 or ITV last night. Some guy who's family owned a holiday house in Spain went out one summer and found the place bulldozed to the ground without his permission. The developer can offer any amount of compo he wants (or none at all!). The guy in the program was luck - he got half what his place was worth.

Bad s**t. Sooner it's outlawed the better.

frodi

Quote:"Over the past four years some enterprising developers in collusion with local councils began taking over privately-owned plots at far below the market value."

Crooked county councillors & builders, nothing new there
:mad: