All the latest news from Valencia Property

Last year we wrote that the Valencia Property market had gone mad, you can read it here. (We got a content warning from Facebook that the post was discriminatory, go figure) Now we need to write that it has gone ever more mad, madder perhaps or "completamente loco"? The first two months of the year were the busiest we have ever experienced (In 22 years of doing this) and things are continuing that way so far in March 2022 despite...(Looks around and waves an arm in the air)... the World... so we are going to let you into a few secrets about the Valencia Property market as it stands so you can get ready for what is happening when you visit.

One of the strange things that always seems to confuse people is that at Valencia Property we work for the buyer. Our role of the buyer's agent isn't understood completely by everyone outside of the United States but we have built a business based on that model over the last twenty years and it is starting to be understood here too. However, that doesn't mean our advice is limited to what we explain to our clients, the buyers, at times we have to advise the sellers on what they need to do, get prepared for and finally pay when they sell. So just in case you are a seller, in this article we are going to look at your responsibilities, what you need to provide and what you need to pay when selling your house in Valencia or Spain.

Many years ago, back in the dim and distant past of 2017, in the before days, I wrote an article on this blog about the fact that we are not "lucky" to be living in Valencia or Spain but we have planned it and it's all part of Lifestyle Design, you can read it here. Today I want to expand a little on that blog post and emphasise what a good decision coming to Valencia was and still coming to Valencia can be for you. Let's call today the year 2AC (After Covid) And yes I know Covid is still around and causing major misery to people all around the World so maybe better to call it 2SC (Since Covid) In 2SC the consequences of the Pandemic and mad decisions made in 2016 are coming home to roost around the World but today we are going to compare Valencia with two places that made especially mad decisions in 2016, the UK and the USA.

This week there wasn't supposed to be a blog post. The writer of these posts, that'll be me, Graham, was supposed to be away lapping up the cool, cloudy weather of Asturias in Northern Spain, eating too much, pouring cider from a great height and generally swithching off. However, despite what many people think Covid is still around and it's back big time in Spain this week. It probably got brought back to my house last week from my wife's school and Covid in its infinite wisdom decided to hit the whole family at once, meaning that we didn't have to self isolate in a room at home at least.

I got riled by Facebook this week. I know, I know, I should just avoid it like an increasing number of people are doing but I couldn't let it lie this time. Apparently, according to people in Facebook groups at least, you cannot go to see properties in Valencia at the weekend because, and I quote, "all agents are a bunch of workshy cowboys who don't do anything to justify the commission payments they receive on making sales". And as you know people in Facebook groups are reasonable people with considered opinions who are not know-alls at all and know everything about everything despite never having worked in any of the industries they opine on so it must be true right?

When I first moved to Valencia in 1998 we lived in a small rented house in L'Eliana. My wife had visited Valencia to look for a place while I prepared the van for the move and she was advised by everyone at the school she was going to be working at that L'Eliana was the place to be. She rented a small house with a patio at the back and essentially a fishpond for a pool and we moved in that August. Six months later we bought our own house in la Pobla de Vallbona, the next town out from L'Eliana, because we couldn't afford the prices of L'Eliana and La Pobla was around 30% cheaper despite the fact you can walk from one to the other in 20 minutes. Over twenty years later L'Eliana continues to be the place that people from Valencia aspire to live in, along with a few others that we will mention later and La Pobla continues to be around 30% cheaper because the basics don't change.

We have just produced the final episode of the first series of the Valencia Property podcast (You can listen to all the episodes here). We are not finishing with the Podcast we are just going to a new schedule as it has been majorly successful for us as a marketing tool and we love doing it as it gives us more of a connection with our clients. It's amazing how many people listen to podcasts these days. So today we are going to look back at what we have done so far on the podcast, tell you where to find those episodes, look at what the podcast has done for us as a company and look at the state of the property market through the lens of the properties we have sold this year, in terms of prices, availability, nationalities buying and a whole lot more.

Everyone who has been to visit us in the last year has asked the same question in one or more ways, "What has happened to the Brits coming here in the last year?" Americans ask it, the Dutch ask it and virtually everyone else asks us but most of all the Brits who visit us ask it because they can't understand the reason for the harm that has been imposed on their own island by the increasingly corrupt and incompetent UK government. I suppose we get asked it because we are British and everyone is interested in how a country can be so so so stupid as to impose restrictions on its own citizens by leaving the most successful trading and cultural block in the World

Today's post looks at whether you are getting value for money when buying a property in Valencia. To decide this we must look at what we mean by the term value for money because it means different things to different people. What is the measure we are going to use? To determine this we are going to use four metrics. 1) Reference Values 2) Comparative Methods 3) Space and M2 Price 4) National and International Comparisons

Here at Valencia Property we have been working with clients for over twenty years now helping people with buying their properties. It's because of this that it pains us to see what can happen to people when they are looking to buy in Valencia so we thought today we would tell you a few things that are happening in the background so that you can avoid the worst problems. Of course we will always tell you to use our services but we cannot advise you not to use others' services. Some agents are really good, some are ok and some are absolute cowboys. Today, we will talk about some of them, the cowboys of course, and also about the scammers that we featured in our latest podcast which you can listen to here.

One of the main questions we get asked by clients looking to buy Valencia Property is why they need to open a Spanish bank account. Spanish banks aren't known for being easy to deal with and they are certainly going to charge you commissions for just about everything you want to do, and for the mere fact of the existence of the account, so why on Earth would anyone want one. In today's post we are going to let you know why and what to expect.

The European Union wants to crack down on Golden Visa programmes. The War and the perceived abuse of the system by Russians (and also other country's citizens) bearing in mind the current situation in the Ukraine, means that the EU has decided that now might be the time to crack down on the Golden Visa process. We have been dealing with people getting the Golden Visa for years now and the vast majority of our clients being granted the Golden Visa are from North America and latterly the UK. However the crackdown may be more general rather than on individual countries. Only this week a block was put on applications from Russians looking for the Golden Visa in Spain.

Every Monday we publish a blog post but not this week. Tomorrow we will not be publishing we just want to say one thing. "Stop the War" We'll be back next week and in the meantime I'll leave you with this. (Would credit the photo but can't find author. Happy to give credit if found)

Those of you who listen to our podcast might have heard most of this post in the last episode. You too can hear it here along with a lot more information (Also make sure to subscribe for more episodes as they are released each Friday) However, we thought it was better to release this information here too as the more knowledge you have the better informed your decision to purchase Valencia Property will be and it might make more sense written down as there are lots of ifs, buts, maybes and numbers involved.

Those of you who listen to the podcast will have heard about the timelines you need for buying Valencia Property back in episode one (You can get it here and while there listen to our other episodes and subscribe). However, we know that there are some people who prefer reading to listening and therefore today we are going into a deep dive about the timelines you should be thinking about when looking to buy property in Valencia. Now this is an overview and for some people the timeline will change but as a general rule of thumb these are the stages and actions you should be thinking about.