Housesinspain.com,  Thursday, 1 August 2013

 

Can a few meters matter? This won’t be a problem until you make a mortgage application or want to build.

Most buyers realize only if they are at the notary to sign. It can then be too late.

Declared square meters of the house are not always correct.

The house is rarely a true subdivision of the meters built and the actual net square meters of living space. You could say that everyone adds a few m2 in the advertisement; and also on our website.

Illegal outbuildings in square meters.

Recently we took on a house for sale. The owner told us that his 225m2 villa was great.
The owner himself had outlined a plan of the house. He earned his living as a painter and draftsman so that was a piece of cake for him.
When the appraiser from the bank for the prospective buyer looked at the house, he found discrepancies. The ‘artist’s’ drawings lost value and the truth was discovered.
After some measuring and checking of the original title deed, the property appeared to be official, but only 110 m2.
That was the moment of truth. The remaining meters were built without a permit and therefore illegal.

Valuation for a mortgage.

The square footage of the deed is the only gauge the appraiser uses for the valuation of the property. That is only for the application for a mortgage and that is what usually matters.
End of story. Low valuation (half of the purchase price) means insufficient funding and no sale.

Suppose the buyer hasn’t used a bank to buy.

Even in the preliminary contract, there are often too many m2, taken from the website advertisement.
The moment of truth often comes at the time of signing with the notary. Most buyers are then so energized that they accept the difference, or not even notice it and sign the transfer deed.

How do you check the actual m2?

The actual square footage can be found in the title deed of the property that you are going to buy. Even better is to see a recent extract from the house retrieved from the property register.

A well documented provisional deed is a necessity.

Make sure you always have a copy of the original document or an extract from the property register as an annex added to the preliminary sale agreement. However tentative the deed may be, this is the document that the whole deal is based on. Even more important, you also make your deposit to the seller based on this.

Also, the Spanish system can be wrong.

Spain has a dual system.

The cadastre and the property register
are the two bodies already registering property in Spain and mapping.
Or rather one records and the other maps.

These two agencies work well, but don’t always concur.

Differences in the plot area are almost standard.

This can be solved.
Enabling a topographer, who measures the actual surface of the land, is the first step in this process. Depending on the situation, the time it takes to agree the right amount may take a number of years.

Advance check is better.

Everything is pre-checked, but you must do it carefully. Trust is good, control is better. This is obvious; in practice I aim to do the latter.