New life, new outlook on life - Page 2

Haha..I wish I was fluent but doubt I ever will be. I studied Spanish for 2 years before thinking of making the move & got here & found the Andalucían accent very hard to understand. I’m getting more used to it now but up until the COVID crisis was attending weekly classes & cant wait to get back to them. Speaking Spanish to locals takes confidence & I’m only just finding it now. Again, I would suggest you rent first & take a good look around before committing your (hard earned Im sure) cash into a property especially in these uncertain times. If you prefer to buy it’s definitely a buyers market & as someone else said prices are dropping but conversely if things don’t work out you may find it difficult to sell your property and get your cash out. We too were initially thinking of buying a property but knew we wanted to rent. In first instance until we looked around. Having looked around and done our research we’ve decided renting is definitely best for us. Renting is much more common in Spain & Europe than in the UK. Happy to help, if I can, with any other questions you might have. Jane 

Hi Jane

thanks again, all this is really helpful. Do you work out there? I’m 45 and husband 52. I know the accent there seems very quick so is difficult to follow. I know my friend out there and her daughters are now fluent and her youngest born out there is bilingual. So much research to do!

No worries. No we are early retirees. Very lucky indeed. I know that jobs are very hard to come by as unemployment very high. Most expats are self employed, quite a few with their own shops, hairdressers etc. I have a friend who was looking for job here & found it impossible and now works as carer in UK 3 weeks on, 3 weeks back in Spain & that works for her. Good luck !! 

My husband works in transport but also qualified chef. I currently work for county hall in HR but quite versatile

Hi Suzanne.  We moved out in June last year and spent 6 months looking around for a house.  We eventually found the one we wanted after 42 viewings on the Coin border with alhaurin el grande.  The taxes on a house purchase here are 10% so something to consider when you are budgeting and solicitors fees were about €2k.  We used Manzanares in alhaurin el grande and we were very happy with their services.  I would recommend that you rent first, get to know the area and look at different properties before you decide.  We were quite shocked at the state of some that we saw - lots had structural defects and needed € € spending on them to bring them up to a good standard.  Good luck for the future 😎