Our Spanish Dream - Part 9: The Search Begins

Date Created: 14.01.2015

We started looking mainly at 2 bedroom apartments and townhouses, large enough to accommodate a sofa bed in the lounge and for six people to be able to stay comfortably.  Armed with a ‘score sheet’ for each property we began the search.  Despite having a very clear criteria this was our first lesson in estate agents showing you what they want to sell rather than what you want to buy.  Slowly we began to convince them to rule out areas and styles.  No-mid floor apartments, it had to be either ground floor with a garden or upper floor with a solarium (roof terrace) as we wanted more than just a balcony.  Although tempting to go further back as the properties were generally bigger for the same price, we wanted within a mile of the beach.  Some of the pools were not just out of sight but over a minutes’ walk away – no good at all.  Some just had an alley between you and the opposite neighbour, far too close for comfort. 

We dismissed property after property after property.

We were really leaning towards a townhouse now rather than an apartment but began to wonder if, within our price range, there was a property matching our requirements.  At best the scores were hitting 7/10, most considerably less.  If the house was good then the location was wrong or the pool too far away.  If the location and pool were good then the house was too small.  Then one day we hit the jack-pot.  We actually found not one but three possibilities!   That evening we sat and studied the details of all three again and again.  We listed them in preference order and the following day made an offer on number one, the property that really did score a 10/10.  This was it, we were actually about to buy a house in Spain!

Dave and Bev Townsend have two homes, their main one in Norwich and a second home in Playa Flamenca in south Costa Blanca, Spain which they also let as a holiday rental www.house-by-the-pool.com   They run a property finding business offering a free service for those seeking to buy a property in the Costa Blanca (Alicante) or the Mar Menor area of the Costa Calida (Murcia) www.SpanishDreamProperty.com   Bev has family in Spain and they intend to move there full-time in a couple of years.