All the latest news from Valencia Property

This is a very difficult post to write for various reasons but as the question comes up so often on all social media platforms it's an important one to know if you are planning on moving to Valencia with children. What are the schools like in Valencia? The first thing to recognise is that any move to Valencia with kids will not be successful if you are not happy with the education of them.

As you may have noticed if you are anywhere in Europe we have reached peak summertime and the temperatures are rising. You may also have noticed this living in the States during the World Cup with the infamous "Hydration Breaks" which are sort of needed in 35ºC heat but not so much when you are in an air conditioned stadium at 21ºC.

As with every year we look into the cost of living in Valencia and then compare it with the cost of living where many of our clients are coming from. We use up to date data from Numbeo to provide the reports. Numbeo is a real time platform where people living in the cities report what they are finding for day to day costs, quality of life issues and more. For a numbers nerd like yours truly it's a treasure trove of information. This year for the first time we are also using Perplexity to investigate the results and provide some graphics saving me a lot of time on putting together the comparisons. By the way you can see last year's post here if you want to compare what has changed.

Some people seem to think that estate agents keep back the best properties for themselves or deliberately don't advertise bargains because... well... reasons! They assume that there are many, many more properties for sale than those they can find online and that if only the agent would release the details to them then they could pick up a bargain. They tell us when we say that what they are looking for doesn't exist at the price that, "They have seen the perfect place online". Really? So today we are going to look at the truth behind online listings or the little things you need to look out for in Spanish real estate ads so that you are not caught out by less than 100% clear descriptions.

We've started strongly in what is destined to become an interesting year. Prices are still climbing, the commuter belt is absolutely flying, and from 1 June every resale buyer in the region gets a tax cut that improves the numbers on their purchase. However, don't put off your purchase until that date. Prices will rise by more than the 1% tax reduction between now and then. If you are able to make a deposit now at today's prices and complete after the 1st of June then go for it but many owners will want a quicker completion than that. Nevertheless , I'm pretty sure that there will be no completions in May, they will all wait until after the 1st of June. Let's take a look at what's happening in some of our favourite places. Here's what the data is showing at the moment and why. 

It's 11pm. You've got a glass of Rioja, your laptop open, and you're deep into page 17 of Idealista, mentally furnishing a three-bedroom in Ruzafa. We get it. We've helped hundreds of clients who started exactly the same way. And here's the thing: we're not going to tell you to stop. Portals like Idealista, Fotocasa, and Kyero are genuinely useful. They'll give you a sense of what €350,000 buys in the city centre versus the suburbs. They'll teach you the difference between a bajo and an ático, in fact they'll teach you loads of estate agent vocabulary. They're excellent for homework, and we're all for homework, language based and otherwise

With over a quarter of a century of experience in the Valencia Property market you would think we already had a client handbook but no, we didn't. So after that slight oversight, now we finally have. Over the last few weeks we have been working on a series of booklets to provide clients and partners so they quickly and concisely get to understand the Valencia Property and Stepping Stone Rentals offer.

Last week we wrote about the new Valencia Property Client Handbook. You can see the article at the link. We promised that this week we would be doing the same for Stepping Stone Rentals and as they say in Spanish "Lo prometido es deuda" (A promise is a promise) so here it is. With more and more of our Valencia Property clients starting their Valencia story with a three‑ to six‑month rental, it was about time Stepping Stone Rentals had its own client handbook just like it was the case for Valencia Property.

We wrote an article back in 2019 called "What Are The Running Costs of Your Valencia Property?" It was one of the most read articles on the blog and still gets a lot of traffic today. The problem is it's now seven years old, the world has changed and continues to change at an even faster pace. In fact the World is now in a totally different place. Lots of things can change in seven years. Let's make a list shall we. Since 2019 we have had a global pandemic, a continuing war in Ukraine, an energy crisis across Europe as a result, inflation that made your eyes water due to supply chain issues during the pandemic and after, and now we have that idiot in the White House dragging the US and Israeli coalition into a war with Iran that has closed the Straits of Hormuz (unless you send the Theocracy 2 million in untraceable Bitcoin) and sent global energy markets into chaos yet again. Oil has gone above $100 a barrel for the first time since the Ukraine crisis and European gas prices have doubled since the start of the year. The UK, Germany, Italy and others are bracing for another round of energy price pain.

Last week we looked at electricity costs in detail and how Spain's renewable revolution has changed the game for property owners. You can read that article here. This week we are covering the rest. IBI, gas, water, community fees, internet, home insurance, security and pool and garden costs. Some of these have changed a lot since 2019 when we wrote the original article. Others have barely moved. Some have even gone down. Let's go through them.

If you are asking us a question then we assume that others have the same question or something similar so on a regular basis we publish some of the latest questions we get because the answers can be useful to everyone. This week we have had a slew of questions via our mail, on social media and directly in meetings with clients. Again we are on holiday as it's Easter and Easter in Valencia unlike much of Spain is the week after Good Friday not the week before because the danger of Easter clashing with Fallas and giving everyone nearly three weeks off would be too tempting. However, this Easter a couple of us are working in Valencia, or at least doing as much as possible within the limitations of owners and agents being away because kids are on holiday.

We are doing a bit of housekeeping on the site and have decided to give this page more visibility. It's one of the most important things you can do when preparing your Valencia Property purchase and that's your background reading to make sure you know everything about the processes involved in buying property in Valencia. Of course you should also be downloading our guides, listening to the podcast and keeping an eye on our Youtube channel and socials but perhaps the most important is reading and inwardly digesting the following posts.

If you are interested in buying Valencia Property you may already have an idea of what you want, your ideal property if you like. The more we know about what you are looking for the better chance we have to help you find that property. Therefore, fill in the form below and let us know what you want. The more information you provide the better the choice we can find for you!

Buying property in Spain as a foreigner is not straightforward. The market works differently, the paperwork is in Spanish, and the processes that seem normal at home don't apply here. What our clients say, consistently and over 25 years, is that having someone on your side from day one makes all the difference. Not just to find the right property — but to get you through the whole thing without losing your mind.

If you are selling a property in Valencia then you need to know what capital gains tax you may be liable for. This is especially true if you are a non-resident seller as the numbers can get complicated at times due to a misunderstanding of what the 3% retention applied at the notary involves.

If you have spent any time on the property portals, and we know you have if you are reading this because you are looking for that elusive Valencia property bargain, then you’d be forgiven for thinking you can still pick up a nice flat in Valencia city for 120,000 or 150,000 euros. You can't. Scroll a bit further and there are “bargains” everywhere with not so shiny photos, certainly tempting prices, and descriptions that make it sound like you’re one click away from your new life in Ruzafa or by the beach. You aren't. They come with issues.

This is the follow up piece from our initial post on Monday about your budget for property in Valencia. In that post we talked about the lower budgets and showed the limitations that you had and how it's usually much better to go outside of the city to the surrounding towns to get more for your money. If your lifestyle focus is just city life then you have to compromise more in the property you want to get that lifestyle. Remember, the lifestyle doesn't refer to your home, it refers to the experience of living, what surrounds you, facilities, amenities, shopping, entertainments and the like.

Near the end of 2024 in my infinite wisdom I decided I needed another project because running three businesses wasn't challenging enough of course. I saw that there was a restaurant for sale in La Pobla at a decent looking price, one that we used to love visiting actually, and I thought "Yeah, why not? I don't want to run a restaurant but to do something with this would be interesting". This is the story of the 17 month odyssey to get to the point where we are now of actually using the place on a daily basis. But how? The plans changed from start to finish and in today's post I'm going to explain what happened. Why there are 17 months in the intervening period, why you should never trust a builder to order your windows from Poland and why when the neighbours complain you shouldn't really worry too much.