The vacation home paying for itself with vacation rentals sounds great in theory, which is why property sellers make the argument so enthusiastically. Nothing could be easier, they would have you believe. But in reality you have to be careful when renting a property in Spain. Dodgy rental agents, tourist squatters, and lousy returns lie in wait for unsuspecting vacation home owners.
One of the biggest problems you face as a holiday home owner in Spain, in addition to the oversupply of rental properties, is finding a rental agency that you can trust to transfer the full portion of the rental income to you. rent.
“I was using an agent to rent my apartment in Duquesa on the Costa del Sol,” explains Trudie Day, 47, from Surrey, who now lives in Puerto Banús. “I cleaned after each client myself because I live nearby, so I knew exactly when the apartment was rented. They still didn’t pay me all the rent they owed me, and they told me to prove it when I challenged them. I live in Spain, but they still scammed me.”
Agents who rent on the sly and pocket the money are a serious problem, especially for absentee landlords who don’t visit much. But this scam isn’t the only problem absentee homeowners face. They also run the risk of unauthorized use of their property.
Helen Dalton, 38, from London, used to rent out her flat near Marbella through a local agency. It was only after the rental agency closed that she realized that her property was being used without her knowledge.
“Little things like towels and sheets went missing,” Dalton says. “Eventually, it became apparent that other people were using our penthouse when we weren’t there. We changed the locks, but they came in and changed the locks too. I arrived on a holiday and found I couldn’t get into my own house.”
The Dalton property ticks all the boxes and rents well to tourists. But to prevent ‘tourist squatters’, Dalton now has a long-term tenant who pays by the month what he might get by the week in high season. “I will never get involved in tourist rentals again,” says Dalton. “You just don’t know who has the keys to your property.”
Stories of absentee landlords being ripped off by rental agents abound. “I’ve heard of rental agency staff using clients’ properties without permission for all sorts of things, including family vacations,” says a Marbella-based lawyer. “If you don’t live locally, it’s hard to know what’s going on on your property. But that’s a problem for absentee owners everywhere, not just in Spain.”
Today, thanks to the Internet, you can solve the problem of questionable rental agents by doing it yourself. Vacation rental websites allow you to advertise your property to a wide audience, accept reservations, and post availability, all for a fixed monthly fee. “You save 20% or more that rental agents charge and you know exactly who is in your property,” explains Ross McGowan, Sales Director at holiday-rentals.co.uk. “If you treat it like a business and put in the time, it can be very rewarding.”
Self-managing a rental isn’t for everyone because of the effort it takes, which is why a trusted rental agent remains the preferred option for many vacation homeowners. The challenge is to identify the good agents.
“Ask for client recommendations,” advises the lawyer. “Review rental agreements very carefully, making sure the rental agent’s responsibilities are described in detail. Keep an eye on your utility bills to know when the property is occupied and compare them with reservations.”
Hay, still aware of his experience, emphasizes the importance of obtaining a written confirmation for each reservation. “Without written confirmation you can’t prove anything,” she says. To avoid similar problems, owners need a rental agency with clear procedures and documentation to keep clients informed of reservations.
Some owners choose to rent their properties long-term, thus avoiding the problems of tourist rentals.
Unfortunately, rental laws in Spain favor tenants over owners, so this option comes with its own risks. The eviction process is tortuous and it can take years to evict non-payers, especially if they have children. Landlords can lose thousands of euros in legal fees and lost rental income if they find a tenant who knows how the system works.
Vince Barnes, 42, a professional musician from Newcastle who now lives in Valencia, knows all about problematic tenants as the owner of a rental property near Gandía, south of Valencia city. “I’ve had enough of being a homeowner in Spain,” Barnes complains. “Short term rentals are a pain in the ass, and when I switched to long term rentals the tenants only paid for 4 months out of 9, caused 2000 euros worth of damage and left me 3000 euros out of pocket, not to mention everything time and aggro”.
Many rental agencies recommend using an 11-month rental agreement to avoid long-term contracts (12 months or more) that provide so much protection for tenants. But the reality is that 11-month leases don’t help landlords, who still have to go through the normal eviction process if tenants don’t pay rent. Landlords should resist the temptation to change the locks or turn off the utilities for problematic tenants; this is against the law and exposes landlords to legal action from non-paying tenants.
Word of the comfortable treatment tenants get from Spain’s rental laws must have reached the UK. A growing number of Brits are taking advantage of the law to live rent-free in Spain, some of them in luxury apartments in glitzy places like Puerto Banús. The Spanish press recently reported that around 26% of non-performing tenants in Spain are foreigners, many of them British, living rent-free in popular tourist areas. Now even the squatters are moving to Spain.