Which village is best for retirement?

Info.....but 30-35 mins. Hope sold campo house before, but never know!  Main line station AVE. 14 mins. Madrid o Valencia, Barcelona. PM for information. I'm staying here in town after almost 20yrs. Feel free. Villas.

Your short list is good, but I'd add Rafal. None of the inland towns have frequent bus services to other towns. Callosa de Segura does have frequent trains running up and down the Alicante-Murcia line but, in my opinion, Callosa is somewhere to live outside of - not in.

Of the options, Almoradí has the most going for it in terms of amenities, culture, mix of nationalities etc.

I think you'll find it cheaper to rent a property rather than pay for a hotel, hostal or B&B.

When buying a country villa you need to know about the Habitacion Certificate and decide if you would consider buying without one but whatever you do, avoid National Parks. You may also encounter septic tanks and agricultural water as a lot of properties are not on mains sewage and some (like ours) do not have mains water and you may not have a postal delivery. Decent heating from October to March/April will be needed.
Although it is not common to have a survey done, especially if no mortgage is involved, unless you have a good range of DIY skills I would recommend you do, making sure everything is listed on the deeds and make any offer dependent on this. Any deposit is payable to your Abogado.
Never use the Abogado (roughly translated as solicitor) recommended by the estate agent however cheaper, quicker and easier the estate agent tells you it will be.
The areas you mention are all within easy distance of the coast, airport and motorways with plenty of UK ex-pats mixed in with other Northern Europeans and the local Spanish population. You can have Fish & Chips or tapas at the local bar, all close by.
I agree with Jim about a holiday rental as you should get good rates in March.
Enjoy yourselves, take your time, keep your wits about you and can I recommend some excellent reading?

Jim's guides - your complete guide to Spain

Many thanks, will take all your advice on board. Yes we also do not want a septic tank and would prefer to be on mains water. We will take our time and explore the areas carefully.

Thanks for the info. We will add Rafal to our list of places to explore.

If you are looking at country properties it may be difficult to find one which doesn’t have a septic tank. This should not pose a problem, they have be used by all countries for years and are a perfectly hygienic method ofsewage disposal. I believe, as I came across a reference some time ago, that when a property is sold now, if it does not use mains drainage, that the septic tank has to comply with current EU legislation, ie that it is a modern system and not one of the old brick built type. It would be worth asking your abogado about this or/and your surveyor just to check.

We are out in the campo and also have a huge water ‘deposito’ below the house, from which water is pumped into the house. There is mains water out here, but unfortunately we are at the end of the supply and if we bypass the deposito we have very low pressure. Again, this is not a problem; it actually stems from the days when the water supplies were much less efficient than nowadays and most campo houses had them; at my parents’ house when we first came years ago, we had water delivered by tanker once a fortnight - you soon learn the art of water conservation!!

None of the above poses problems, but as Cheryl says, double check everything with a country property. We are in a National park, but are legal ‘fuera de ordenacion’, ie legal but with restrictions, we don’t care, we like our house! But the estate agents are unlikely to tell you this, we only found out from our abogada, but still went ahead as it presents no problems to us.

Hi , we retired a few years ago and spent a long time looking for the right area and villa from Denia to Mazarron.We now live in San Luis, it has everything we need shops, large supermarket , bars ,restaurants a good health center and a regular bus service .Its only a ten minute drive to the beach and is close to other villages/ towns.

Buenas dias Lynne,

Thanks for your reply. We will have a look at San Luis. Did it take you many months to find your ideal home? Our plan is similar to yours, to rent for a few months to explore different areas and then view properties in an area we like. Finding a good estate agent is a must. Do you have any good ones that you used? How has it been making new friends? I expect you have found this forum really useful.

Salud

Pat & Rose.

Hello

Consider Crevillent:  5 minutes to autovia, 5 minutes to local train: 8 minutes to the high speed AVE, 20 minutes beach, 2 minutes (car) to a range of supermarkets; 4 minutes to fantastic health centre, 8 minutes to the best hospital on the Costa Blanca, a house with EU conforming septic tank, pool, all amenities.  And, its for sale without Agents fees!

Just PM me.

Kind regards

Richard