Off-plan and new-build property lawyers in Marbella.

01

Your stage payments, guaranteed

The Spanish Building Act (Ley 38/1999, de Ordenación de la Edificación), in its first additional provision, requires any housing developer who takes payments before or during construction to guarantee their repayment, plus statutory interest, through a joint and several bank guarantee or a surety insurance policy. When you sign, the developer must hand you the document evidencing it, specific to the amounts you will pay, and the payments go into a special account kept separate from the developer's other funds.

• We review the bank guarantee or policy before each payment: who issues it, what it covers, whether it identifies your property and how long it is valid.
• We check that your payments go into the development's special account and not into another account of the developer.
• We verify the building licence, the developer's title to the land and any charges registered at the Land Registry.
• We review the payment schedule, completion date, building specification and penalties in the contract.

02

Licences: from construction to occupation

Without a building licence you should not pay anything: from that point the law requires your payments to be guaranteed. Once the building is finished, under Andalusia's Law 7/2021 on territorial sustainability (LISTA), occupation of a building constructed with, and in accordance with, a licence generally requires a responsible declaration, instead of the former first occupation licence. The notary will not authorise the deed of the finished new building without the technical end-of-works certificate, the occupation licence or the declaration replacing it, and the ten-year structural insurance. We check all of this before you pay the balance of the price.

03

If the developer is late or never finishes

If construction does not start or the property is not handed over by the agreed date, the law lets you choose: terminate the contract and recover your payments on account, taxes included, plus statutory interest, or grant the developer a written extension.

If the developer does not repay after a formal demand, the claim goes to the guaranteeing bank or the insurer. Watch the clock: if you let the statutory period run from the breach without demanding termination and repayment, the guarantee expires. And where there was no guarantee, the Spanish Supreme Court has in certain cases held liable the bank that received the payments without requiring one. We send the formal demand and, if there is no settlement, take the claim to court.

04

Handover, deeds and defects

Handover comes with the purchase deed, once the developer has executed the deed of new building and horizontal division that makes your home a separate registered property. We review the deed, the statement of what you have paid and the release or apportionment of the developer's mortgage, and at the handover inspection we put the snagging list in writing. VAT and stamp duty (AJD) are explained on our property purchase page.

After that, the law sets periods running from acceptance of the works: ten years for structural damage, three for defects affecting habitability and one for finishing defects, for which the builder is liable. The developer is liable to you together with the other parties involved, and you have two years from when the damage appears to bring a claim.