Good advice when buying a property on the Costa del Sol should help you understand what is involved, make informed decisions and enjoy the process without needless worry.
"Hang on a minute. Think this through."
It is very easy to get excited when you are buying property, particularly when things are going well. Sometimes, however, somebody needs to say, “Hang on a minute. Think this through.”
When one property suddenly became three
I remember an occasion around 22 or 23 years ago when Sven and I were with a relatively young client who was buying an off-plan property at La Cala Hills. His intention was quite straightforward. He would put down the deposit, proceed to the private purchase contract and then sell the property on before completion, hopefully making a profit in the process.
He had reserved one property and, as we were driving away, he suddenly said something along the lines of, “I think I'll do another two.” We could quite easily have turned the car around and gone straight back. Instead, Sven and I both had much the same reaction. “Hang on a minute. Think this through.”
The important point was that by putting down a reservation deposit and then signing the private purchase contract, he wasn't simply reserving something that he could walk away from if his plans changed. He was committing himself to buying the property if he wasn't able to sell the contract prior to completion.
With the first property, there wasn't really a problem. If he couldn't sell it on before completion, he could afford to complete the purchase himself. But what happened if he reserved three? His plan depended on being able to sell the properties before he had to complete on them. What if the market changed? What if buyers disappeared? What if, for whatever reason, he simply couldn't sell them?
Could he afford to complete on all three?
It was his decision, not ours
We didn't tell him not to do it. If he had thought it through, understood the risk and decided that he was completely comfortable proceeding with another two, that would have been his decision. But we felt he needed to stop and think about what he was committing himself to before getting carried away with the excitement of the moment. We had to say, “Hang on a minute. Think this one through.”
He slept on it.
The following day he told us, “You're right. One's enough.” As it happened, everything worked out very well. He subsequently sold the property before completion and made a profit, so his original idea wasn't wrong. The point was that with one property, he could afford the consequences if things didn't work out as he hoped. With three, he couldn't.
Good advice isn't always the advice that makes another sale
Had we simply been thinking about making another couple of sales, turning the car around would have been the obvious thing to do. But it wouldn't have been the right thing to do.
Ultimately, it had to be his decision and his responsibility. Our responsibility was to make sure he had thought about what could happen if things didn't go according to plan. Neither Sven nor I wanted to encourage him into buying another two properties and then, if everything went wrong, spend the next 20 years hoping we didn't bump into him in the supermarket.
None of us knows with certainty what a property market is going to do next. Sometimes being fair with somebody simply means asking the question that gets forgotten when everybody is excited: “What if?”
If you are thinking about buying a property on the Costa del Sol, good advice should help you understand what is involved, so that there are no unnecessary surprises and you can take things in an ordered way and enjoy the process without needless worry. And if you do start getting carried away with the excitement of the moment, it helps to have somebody alongside you who is prepared to say, “Hang on a minute. Think this through.”
We are here to give you help and advice throughout your Costa del Sol property purchase.
