Dilemma

You will undoubtedly get the view that the Brit ex-pat market is tiny in Spain, and its loss won't affect things. It's mostly a view held by Brit ex-pats living in Spain. I think it's a point of view designed to instil a sense of superiority, or whatever. But the reality is in the Costas, the market is driven by overseas buyers, of which Brits used to make up a substantial portion. I don't have the exact number to hand, but it's a lot.

BREXIT will dent this demand, a lot, an awful lot, but the general feeling from those in the know was that the market could handle it without too much of a downturn. But now, with the general downturn in the economy, especially in areas that are reliant on tourism, due to the pandemic, plus the fact that lots of overseas buyers no longer exist, BREXIT will compound the problems for what was already an overheating property market. 

In short, the market may not crash (define crash?), but considering prices were already inflated (driven by property developers and overseas buyers), a substantial adjustment is coming.

For now, some property in some areas is holding up, even going up, in line with what is happening across Europe, this is being driven by people moving out of the cities, whether this will impact the Costas I'm not sure, but what is for sure is that prices are relatively stable at the moment, but it's not going to last. There is nothing on the horizon to indicate prices will be maintained or even go up, but everything to say prices will drop.

Morning.

If you bought the place to use primarily as a holiday home but with an option to retire there in 10 years or so do you have any real imperative to sell?

Clearly covid has meant you and others can't currently holiday here and at the face of it you might face higher hurdles to retire here but 10 years is a long time and things will change for better or for worse.

The rental question might be a distraction as you say it wasn't a consideration of your original purchase.

Maybe the wrong time to do anything is whilst we are still in a pandemic with restricted travel and curbs on behaviour - my suggestion would be to wait until things improve, maybe come out for a holiday when Algorfa and surrounding areas are more open and see if you still have any love for the place.

Morning and thank you for your reply. We still love the property, Algorfa and Spain in general. Our planned retirement is now six years away, time enough for things to change again. I think you are right about the timing of any decision is maybe not right just now and if we were to sell that’s the end of the dram for sure. And who knows we may just win the lottery in the meantime and still be able to afford it all. One thing that seems really unclear to me is if you need this 32k every year, so 64k after two years etc, or if the original deposit has to be in the bank each year, so 32k on each anniversary. Does anyone know for sure yet? I have found many procedures baffling in the extreme since buying property, and you don’t know what you don’t know. Maybe it will become clearer over time, hopefully!!

There are some threads on here covering people passing through the, new for British, non lucrative visa - as time passes more use cases will emerge and appear on the forums for people to read.

Just out of interest you say you are 6 years now from retirement, will you have a mix of private and or state pensions? Whatever you do have in pension income will count towards the new requirements and I think we are seeing cash balances being considered for the shortfalls - not forgetting you already own a property in Spain so no rent or mortgage to pay.

In reality I am sure many will have a blend of regular pension income plus cash balances to get them over the line.

I'd sit tight if I were you, I still live in hope that we'll rejoin the customs union and we'll regain our freedoms including freedom of movement, neither side can afford to take too big a financial hit on top of the pandemic so common sense could prevail.

The customs union and FOM are two completely different things. You might get the former but absolutely won't get the latter, not in the next decade or so. And even then, it's highly unlikely.

Not entirely true Bob, NI are in the customs union and have retained freedom of movement, the EU have their 4 pillars which ´cannot be divided, so you take the customs union and you take freedom of movement, Norway and Switzerland are not in the EU but are in the EEA which is basically the customs union and both have maintained fredom of movement.

I stand to be corrected, but I don't believe Northern Ireland has freedom of movement. My understanding is that people who live there either hold an Irish or UK passport. Those with Irish passports are Irish, so are still able to travel throughout the EU as a full member citizen, those with a UK passport are British, so are not. I'm unclear on the conditions as to which passport Northern Ireland residents get to hold, maybe they get a free choice? Northern Ireland remains part of the UK and so EU citizens do not get free movement there. I am happy to be corrected on this if I'm wrong. Sadly, there are enough nationalist idiots in the UK who will allow themselves to be guided up by racists to always oppose anything that allows "Johnny Foreigner" into the UK. 

Your plan might still work, so don't rush the decision.

If you sell your UK house (or downsize it to a flat), you might have the necessary cash reserves to gain Non-Lucrative Visas (NLV).

It does look like demonstrating resources to the Spanish Authorities can include pension income + cash in the bank.

In the next (say) 6 months or so, this forum will probably see a trickle of people obtaining NLVs, so we will know for certain.

Best wishes