Friday 19 June 2015

Our Spanish Dream - Part 28: Keyholders Number 3

Our Spanish Dream - Part 28: Keyholders Number 3

    
So our holiday in October 2011 didn’t get off to a very good start, sacking the keyholders in the first couple of days. We had two weeks to find new ones and get them up to speed. We somehow heard about a new business locally so I emailed the lady. She was away on holiday so couldn’t come and see us until the following week but we made the appointment anyway. In the mean time I sat and put together a full ‘check-list’ for every single room and the outside areas of what we wanted doing before and after every guest. It was very long! The bottom line was simply that we wanted it as clean and presentable as we would like to find it ourselves if we were paying to stay there. We set the bar high.
The next day the air conditioning engineer arrived to service the units. We told him what was going on and he said his wife was looking for a small job and he would mention it to her. We met up, she was very pleasant, I showed her my check list and she took the job on a trial basis over the winter. Knowing she may not be carrying on beyond that we still met the other lady. She was immaculately turned out and I wondered how she could keep her perfect nails so good when she loved cleaning, she was very professional and we liked her. We explained that we had taken on someone over the winter but would like to keep her details in case it didn’t work out.
Our new keyholder was great for two seasons, but a change in her circumstances seriously dropped us in at the deep end when she had to move on short notice out of the area with her husband’s job in December 2013. She was so embarrassed about leaving us in the lurch she just left most of the keys in the house, locked up, sent us an email and posted the front door key back to us!  So in January 2014 we were again keyholder-less with a house in Spain and us in the UK!
 
 
Dave and Bev Spanish Dream Properties
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.comThey 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.
 

Friday 12 June 2015

Our Spanish Dream - Part 27 Keyholders Numbers 1&2

Our Spanish Dream - Part 27: Keyholders Numbers 1&2

    
Keyholding is both the most important part of a successful rental and the most frustrating part of your rental!  When we first bought the house a lady at the estate agents said she would be happy to keyhold and meet guests when they arrived.  The guests would then pay her the cleaning and laundry fee before they left.  (It’s important that you show this as an extra on all your ads.)  So we paid her an annual fee and thought that we had things sorted.  The problem was that she really didn’t have the time to do the job properly and wasn’t flexible enough to fit around arrival and departure times of guests.
Towards the end of the first season she recommended a local business set up as full-time keyholders and cleaners.  Run by three people it went very well for the first 2 years.  Then one left and another couple joined, but the two couples fell out within months and the business was down to two people.  They had more work than they could handle properly and standards dropped so we had a heart to heart.  They asked for a second chance and we stupidly agreed.  The next season was a disaster!
They didn’t clean to the standard required, didn’t water our plants and the quality of service was going down all the time.  When we arrived ourselves at the end of the season I cried at the presentation.  It took us two solid days of cleaning for about 10 hours each day to get the house to a standard we wanted and we still had to do our usual twice yearly cleaning of voiles, bed covers, windows, shutters and cupboards and do the inventory.  So in October 2011 we sacked the keyholders!
Sacking your keyholders is fine if they are doing a bad job, but it rather leaves you in a difficult position when you return to the UK and you have no-one taking care of the house or preparing it for renters.
Some quick thinking was needed!

Dave and Bev Spanish Dream Properties
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.comThey 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.

Sunday 7 June 2015

Our Spanish Dream - Part 26: You can’t get sea sick on a pedalo!


So having chosen south Costa Blanca as the place to buy a property because it is one of the few areas in Spain that doesn’t have mountains or lots of windy roads, due to my travel/motion sickness problems, you would think I’d be sensible enough to stay away from other things that cause an issue. But this is me, and I don’t always do the sensible thing. I have always hated the idea of depriving my family the joys others take for granted, so over the years I have been the ‘bag-holder’, standing for hours, totally bored and with aching feet, while my family have shrieked and squealed their way around several theme parks.
 
Benidorm may not be my idea of a nice resort but we have used the amenities there on several occasions. 
So I have stood for hours by the rides at the 
Terra Mitica theme park, tried not to get dizzy watching the children on rides at Mundo Mar and numerous fun fairs, and even braved bobbing about on the sea.
 
We have taken the short ferry ride from Denia to Moraira; I’m sure it was picturesque but I wasn’t able to look. We took a glass bottomed boat out to the waters around Calpe Ilfach to see the underwater life, and while they let me sit in the bottom looking at the fish it was fine, but then I had to sit up-top when they moved and that wasn’t fine. But I guess the classic was the pedalo – I have never been allowed to forget insisting that “you can’t get sea sick on a pedalo” and proving myself very wrong.
 
I’m sure there are many more attractions than I will never visit now my children can go without me that involve been spun around, flung around or tossed about in the Costa Blanca but please, do go an investigate them yourselves because the report won’t be what you would like to hear if you ask me to try them out for you..

Dave and Bev Spanish Dream Properties
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.comThey 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.