More houses under the Spanish hammer

demolishDemolition orders have been issued on 17 homes in Cantoria, in the Almeria region of Andalusia. Twelve of the properties are owned by British expats.

The orders were the result of a court decision which ruled that the properties were built unlawfully on rural land without planning permission.

No date has been set for the homes to be bulldozed.

Three weeks ago, two homes owned by Brits were bulldozed in Cantoria. Since 2008, five British homes have been destroyed in the province.

One British couple who received one of the new demolition orders said they paid €250,000 in 2006 for their three-bedroom house within an estate of 70 houses.

They began to suspect there was a problem when they tried to register the property after having bought it. They were told there was no land registry number for the plot.

Their lawyer eventually informed them that the property was not legal.

Neither they nor the 16 other affected homeowners knew that action had begun against the promoter of the properties already in 2005 and learned this only through this week’s ruling.

That promoter has been given a 14 month prison sentence and fined €6,500 for his part in the scam, according to reports in Spain. He has not been ordered to compensate the homeowners.

AUAN, an expat-run action group supporting those facing legal issues with their homes, represents 580 British homeowners in Almeria.

Its president Maura Hillen expressed concern that no steps appeared to have been taken to inform the homeowners of the recent case which resulted in demolition orders and hoped they would be able to appeal

AUAN lawyer Gerardo Vázquez said that the British citizens in this case had not received support from the authorities.

"It always seems to happen to British residents. If we compare the number of Britons' houses that are being demolished with the overall size of the British population here, the figures are shocking," he said, according to a report in the El Mundo newspaper.

"Hardly any Spanish homes are being demolished."