More than 300 buyers refuse to sign for Marbella flats for fear they may be illegal
Héctor Barbotta / SUR in English
The licences for two developments in Elviria Sur are under inspection
The majority of the buyers are British residential tourists and investors
Who would want to become the owner of a brand new apartment if there was the chance of it being threatened with the bulldozer? More than 300 buyers of flats located on two developments built in Marbella with allegedly illegal planning permission are refusing to sign the title deeds for their properties and are demanding their deposits back. Both the developer and the bank that backed the project have refuse to return the money and are calling for their clients to finalise the purchase of their properties. The matter is now in the hands of the courts, and the building licences, granted when Jesús Gil and Julián Muñoz were at the helm of the Town Hall and when Juan Antonio Roca was in charge of town planning, are among those currently under inspection by the caretaking committee at the Town Hall.
The conflict is a clear example of the poisoned legacy of 15 years of planning corruption in Marbella and affects two developments in Elviria Sur, Santa María Green Hills and Los Lagos de Santa María. The majority of the buyers are British investors and residential tourists.
The licences in question were granted in 2002 and 2003 by Marbella Town Hall and clearly violate the planning regulations (PGOU) in force at the time, according to sources from the Planning Department, who maintain that neither of the two developments is likely to be granted the first occupancy licence.
Santa María Green Hills is a development of 192 apartments built on land designated for townhouses, although the project also infringes on 700 square metres of road and around a thousand sqaure metres reserved for parks and gardens. Meanwhile Los Lagos de Santa María, a complex with 340 flats, is built on land reserved for detached villas, according to the planning regulations.
Faced with this scenario the buyers, who have paid deposits of between 90,000 and 110,000 euros are refusing to take the transaction any further. Of the more than 500 apartments in both developments, which have practically all been sold, the title deeds for fewer than 150 have been signed, despite the fact that the building work has been completed for a year.
The developer - Los Lagos de Santa María Golf, registered in Granada - is calling for the buyers to meet the commitments they subscribed to when they agreed to purchase the apartment. The firm maintains that the building licences are legal, as they were granted in their day by the Town Hall, and are still fully valid, despite the fact that they are currently under inspection. The firm also interprets what it refers to as “positive silence” as a sign that the first occupancy licence has been granted.
In fact the developers consider themselves to be a “third person who acted in good faith” as they bought the development projects after they had been awarded municipal building licences. One of the developments was purchased from the firm Apex 2000, a subsidiary of Iberdrola, while the other was bought from Sur Inversiones Sema. This latter firm was run by the Italian businessman Giovanni Piero Montaldo, arrested in the third phase of Operation Malaya and charged with bribery.
According to the firm’s representative, Víctor Sánchez, the real reason for the owners to refuse to sign the title deeds has nothing to do with the licences, but with the change in the market and the difficult prospect of selling the properties on. “As they are investors, they don’t want to sign the title deeds because they don’t have buyers. Their investment has backfired”, he argues.
The developers maintain that the delay in drawing up the title deeds is causing them serious problems, as the bank continues to charge them interest.
The Banco Popular, which acts as a guarantor for the amounts paid as deposits, has a similar position. In one of the documents handed in to the court, the bank’s legal representative argues that “if the plaintiffs have not received their properties it’s because they haven’t wanted to”.
The bank also subcribes to the argument that the buyers are property speculators. One of the papers handed in to the court states: “You don’t have to think too much to realise that they bought the properties to speculate with. Now things are getting tough on the Costa del Sol, it’s time to try their luck against the bank and they might at least get their money back plus interest, which wouldn’t be such a bad deal after all”.
Interim committee starts organising green zones
H. Barbotta
At last week’s Town Hall meeting the caretaking committee agreed to start formally transferring roads and green zones in 48 developments in Marbella to public domain. The move will allow them to process 250 applications for private planning permission which had been frozen as the public areas had not been formally ceded to the local authority,
Roca and his former advisors blame Muñoz for Guadalpín irregularities
The former planning consultant and alleged ringleader of the Marbella Town Hall web of corruption, Juan Antonio Roca, was interrogated by the judge about the Hotel Guadalpín project last week. Also questioned on the matter were Roca’s two former collaborators, María Castañón and Raquel Escobar. All three coincided in blaming former Mayor Julián Muñoz for allowing the Guadalpín Hotel to be completed and opened, despite the “serious” irregularities in the construction project.
December 28, 2006 | Category: Real Estate and Investment