A SHARP rise in the number of fixed-rate mortgages in Spain has been reported in the past two years – and they now account for 43% of every new loan taken out.
It takes a village: How to buy your own town in Spain
20/01/2019
BUYING a home in Spain remains very affordable, and comes with the added bonus of providing a pied à terre for sunny holidays. But why stop at one house when you could pick up a whole village? After all, there are literally hundreds to choose from in practically every region. And you get the church thrown in as a free gift.
Admittedly, this isn't an option for anyone on a strictly-limited budget or who wants to avoid risk; turning your newly-purchased village into a habitable residential hotspot may well cost the same amount as the original price tag and plenty more besides, plus you'll need planning permission – even though you're the owner, this doesn't mean you automatically become the mayor and can do what you please once you've moved in. Many of the villages for sale fall under the jurisdiction of a larger town council, and you'll need licences before you start brick-laying. Also, those at the lower end of the price range may not have mains electricity and water – getting onto the grid is costly, and not guaranteed. If there's a handy bore-hole nearby that's included in the overall cost, you could install a pump for water, but you'll need planning permission for this – and solar panels, whilst an excellent, environmentally-friendly idea that eventually saves you a fortune once you've clawed back your investment, involve considerable outlay at first and, again, you might need municipal licences.
Still, if you're up for the challenge, you'll find plenty to choose from.
Celebrity endorsement
Purchasing a whole village for yourself almost became a Hollywood trend a few weeks back: US-born actress Gwyneth Paltrow was seriously considering shelling out the €150,000 needed to buy the hamlet of O Muiñovedro (first picture) in the north-western region of Galicia at the end of 2018. Fluent in Spanish thanks to numerous summers abroad learning the language in Talavera de la Reina (Toledo province) in her youth – a town where she has since been named Adopted Daughter – the blonde star has always been in love with Spain and would have been very comfortable spending time in an off-the-beaten-track patch of the country where local knowledge and lingo would be essential.
But in the end, O Muiñovedro was snapped up by Dutch investors who sought to restore it, possibly for their own use or as a niche holiday rental destination.
Foreign investment is key in selling off abandoned villages: buyers from the USA, México, Brazil, Russia and the Arab countries have been snapping them up in the last couple of years, causing their prices to rise by between 5% and 10% - a trend expected to continue over 2019.
Where to buy on a budget
Almost everyone with a homebuyer's budget – not really first-time buyers, but anyone upwards from there through to multi-millionaires – will find a village to suit their pocket. Of course, considerable additional funds will be needed to make it habitable, and the price range dictates how much work and extra investment is likely to be required; if you're hoping to buy at the lower end of the market, expect a very long and expensive job ahead of you.
The cheapest currently on sale is in the land-locked northern wine region of La Rioja, a village of nine houses and an acre of undeveloped plots which falls under the administrative jurisdiction of the larger location of Los Molinos de Ocón and is just 30 minutes by car from the regional capital, Logroño. Up for grabs for a mere €179,000, its convenient site only 15 minutes from the airport via the main N-111 highway makes it unusually accessible for an 'empty' village, but you wouldn't know it from the paradisiacal landscape: engulfed in oak and beach wood with a magnificent view over the Ebro river and the Leza, Jubera, Arnedo and Arnedillo valleys, you can pretend you're miles from civilisation until it suits.
The downside is that the entire village is in ruins, with little more than the basic structures of the buildings remaining; the best-preserved being the church tower. Also, there's no electricity – the nearest connection is half a kilometre away in the next village – and when it was still occupied, the municipality used a bore-hole for its water supply, which is now thought to be empty.
Next-cheapest and possibly a greater bargain, albeit with fewer homes, is a village in the province of Almería – 78 kilometres from the city and beaches, and 150 kilometres east of Granada, but only six kilometres from the A-92N motorway; a snip at €190,000.
Five buildings, one of which is a garage, include three potential residential properties averaging 100 square metres on each of its two storeys – one, a small cottage, is completely renovated, but only has one double bedroom with a tiny bathroom; another, a large, unfinished family home within the structure of a traditional cortijo or farmhouse with a small, incomplete swimming pool and just under six acres of almond groves, and a third, a semi-detached house with a garden, patio and stable yard, four acres of almond trees, needing total renovation.
Two of the three are uninhabitable, but all are connected to the water and electricity supplies – albeit the larger two have no pipes or wiring.
Take a closer look at our second picture – the La Rioja village is shown in the top two shots and the Almería one in the bottom two.
Mid-priced villages for sale
Snap up a batch of 13 houses in the province of Cáceres in the far-western region of Extremadura, bordering onto the province of Salamanca (Castilla y León) for €300,000 – set in the heart of the Batuecas valley, these buildings all have planning permission and existing plans for 30 apartments, mostly of two bedrooms each. The work still needs to be carried out, at the buyer's cost, but the legal aspects are mostly covered – and you can extend your investment by buying additional batches of houses in the village for around €15,000 per property – 20 of them without plans and as yet uninhabitable, but with existing deeds, and another 40 on the property registry but with their deeds still pending, 10 with deeds on recognised brown-site land, and another 67 in three wider rural zones belonging to the same village which need major renovations, but have all the necessary paperwork. Each of the latter are well-connected by road, but mostly on narrow village streets difficult to get a car down – albeit oozing with character, made with sandstone brick and with slate roofs.
An eight-bedroomed house and a church, four townhouses of two storeys each requiring heavy renovation, a restored former school building and optional extras for an additional price – including garages, warehouses, a swimming pool, henhouses, recreation park with fixed barbecue areas, and 42 apartments needing major works – and six acres of land thrown in but with another 60 available for extra money, you can scoop up your own village in the eastern province of Cuenca, sandwiched between Valencia and Madrid, for €590,000. It's about four kilometres from the nearest large village, which has a pharmacy, health centre, food shops and bar, and around an hour by road from Cuenca city, famous for its 'hanging houses'.
As it's right on the rural tourist trail, the provincial government is offering a small grant to help pay for access roads and signposting, and planning is readily available to convert parts of it into rural guest houses, restaurants, car parking, spas, or to sell off chunks of it privately. Its potential as a visitors' or holidaymakers' country hotspot is huge, given its remote location, as there's practically no competition nearby.
Check these out in picture three – Cáceres at the top and Cuenca at the bottom.
Blow the budget: Multi-million villages
If you have a spare seven-figure sum kicking around, the world of empty hamlets is your oyster – and among the pearls nestled in it is a beautiful abandoned mining village in the far south-western province of Huelva, Andalucía, with a whopping 625 acres of land and buildings totalling 6,000 square metres which, once fully renovated, could be a cluster of luxury homes or a rural holiday complex. The location is ideal for creating a golf course – its on-tap water supply is perfectly sufficient for an 18-hole green – although planning permission would be needed. It could be yours for €2.1 million.
Or a rural complex of 14 houses with a spa, swimming pools, beauty salon, health centre and three-golden-fork restaurant, all fully equipped, within the boundaries of a nature reserve in the province of Granada comes in at just under €2.7m.
Or go straight to the top of the price list and pick up 988 acres of land with buildings that include a total of 19 double bedrooms, with heating and air-con, private and communal terraces and lounges, swimming pool and conference room, stables, warehouses, mechanical workshops, almond and olive groves and even an office and a windmill, all completely renovated, for €6.8m. At 90 kilometres west of the classical city of Salamanca, known as the 'Oxford of Spain', and not far from the Portuguese border, you can hop between two countries on day trips. Take a look at picture four for inspiration.
Why are so many empty villages for sale?
A European Union benchmark defining municipalities as 'abandoned', 'depopulated' or at risk of desertion or demographic demise is 11.5 inhabitants per square kilometre – and 53% of Spain's villages fall into this category.
To put it in perspective, let's use the example of the densely-populated, cosmopolitan coastal town of Jávea on the northern Alicante province coast, a haven for discerning holidaymakers and expats from every continent: home to 27,225 people year-round, according to the last census in 2016, that means each of its 68.59 square kilometres is home to just under 397 people. A town of the same land mass that fell under the 'depopulated' description would have just 789 inhabitants. Sticking with touristy locations, the Costa del Sol beach Mecca of Estepona (Málaga province), is even more densely populated: its 137 square kilometres are home to 66,683 residents, or nearly 487 per square kilometre, whilst an 'abandoned' village of the same surface area would have a mere 1,576 inhabitants. Moving away from the 'traditional' tourist trail, the southern Valencia province coastal town of Tavernes de la Valldigna – a favourite with Spaniards seeking summer beach breaks without the crowds, but largely undiscovered by northern European holidaymakers or expatriates – had 17,485 year-round residents on its census in 2016 occupying its 49.2 square kilometres, or 355 per square kilometre; the total population of a 'demographically-declining' town of the same area size would be only 566.
The high-altitude village of Albarracín in the province of Teruel is very widely spread out, over 452.72 square kilometres, with just 2.3 people living in each, or a total of 1,054 – about the same density as its near neighbour Cascante del Río, whose 32.38 square kilometres house only 74 residents.
'Abandoned' villages, or those at risk of future exodus, can even be found within a 20-minute drive of the most packed-out beaches in Spain: the Vall de Gallinera (northern Alicante province, fifth picture), scattered across a 53.6-square-kilometre valley in eight residential 'clusters' or hamlets, each with a different name, had 582 residents in 2016, or 10.9 per square kilometre.
These 'endangered' villages tend to be inland from the coast – even if they are in coastal provinces and only a few kilometres away from the nearest beach, are normally down winding, single-carriageway lanes, frequently mountain passes, making the distance in terms of driving time much longer – typically in remote, rural areas and, by default, idyllic, picturesque, peaceful and graced by clean, healthy air and an abundance of nature. Perfect for those seeking land for animals, or for a quiet weekend retreat, but not practical for everyday living: too far to commute comfortably to work or school, a long and arduous hike to the nearest shops and GP surgeries and even further from hospitals, and often with poor internet and mobile phone coverage, if any at all. With so few inhabitants, telecommunications companies are not willing to set up networks in these areas, as the number of customers using them means they will run at a loss. So, the mainstay of their economies tends to be agriculture, which is risky and often loss-making; those of working and child-bearing age move to more convenient areas, and the only ones left are retired. In a generation or so, these will have died out – if they haven't already moved to a place where they can easily reach medical services, home care and shops.
Given its sheer size, Spain is the most-threatened EU member State in terms of endangered villages, followed by Portugal where 23% of its territory suffers similar desertion.
And census figures show just how centralised Spain's residential hubs are: the 53% of 'threatened' municipalities are home to a mere 2.5 million people, whilst the remaining 44 million of the country's inhabitants live in the other 47% of towns, villages and cities.
Related Topics
BUYING a home in Spain remains very affordable, and comes with the added bonus of providing a pied à terre for sunny holidays. But why stop at one house when you could pick up a whole village? After all, there are literally hundreds to choose from in practically every region. And you get the church thrown in as a free gift.
Admittedly, this isn't an option for anyone on a strictly-limited budget or who wants to avoid risk; turning your newly-purchased village into a habitable residential hotspot may well cost the same amount as the original price tag and plenty more besides, plus you'll need planning permission – even though you're the owner, this doesn't mean you automatically become the mayor and can do what you please once you've moved in. Many of the villages for sale fall under the jurisdiction of a larger town council, and you'll need licences before you start brick-laying. Also, those at the lower end of the price range may not have mains electricity and water – getting onto the grid is costly, and not guaranteed. If there's a handy bore-hole nearby that's included in the overall cost, you could install a pump for water, but you'll need planning permission for this – and solar panels, whilst an excellent, environmentally-friendly idea that eventually saves you a fortune once you've clawed back your investment, involve considerable outlay at first and, again, you might need municipal licences.
Still, if you're up for the challenge, you'll find plenty to choose from.
Celebrity endorsement
Purchasing a whole village for yourself almost became a Hollywood trend a few weeks back: US-born actress Gwyneth Paltrow was seriously considering shelling out the €150,000 needed to buy the hamlet of O Muiñovedro (first picture) in the north-western region of Galicia at the end of 2018. Fluent in Spanish thanks to numerous summers abroad learning the language in Talavera de la Reina (Toledo province) in her youth – a town where she has since been named Adopted Daughter – the blonde star has always been in love with Spain and would have been very comfortable spending time in an off-the-beaten-track patch of the country where local knowledge and lingo would be essential.
But in the end, O Muiñovedro was snapped up by Dutch investors who sought to restore it, possibly for their own use or as a niche holiday rental destination.
Foreign investment is key in selling off abandoned villages: buyers from the USA, México, Brazil, Russia and the Arab countries have been snapping them up in the last couple of years, causing their prices to rise by between 5% and 10% - a trend expected to continue over 2019.
Where to buy on a budget
Almost everyone with a homebuyer's budget – not really first-time buyers, but anyone upwards from there through to multi-millionaires – will find a village to suit their pocket. Of course, considerable additional funds will be needed to make it habitable, and the price range dictates how much work and extra investment is likely to be required; if you're hoping to buy at the lower end of the market, expect a very long and expensive job ahead of you.
The cheapest currently on sale is in the land-locked northern wine region of La Rioja, a village of nine houses and an acre of undeveloped plots which falls under the administrative jurisdiction of the larger location of Los Molinos de Ocón and is just 30 minutes by car from the regional capital, Logroño. Up for grabs for a mere €179,000, its convenient site only 15 minutes from the airport via the main N-111 highway makes it unusually accessible for an 'empty' village, but you wouldn't know it from the paradisiacal landscape: engulfed in oak and beach wood with a magnificent view over the Ebro river and the Leza, Jubera, Arnedo and Arnedillo valleys, you can pretend you're miles from civilisation until it suits.
The downside is that the entire village is in ruins, with little more than the basic structures of the buildings remaining; the best-preserved being the church tower. Also, there's no electricity – the nearest connection is half a kilometre away in the next village – and when it was still occupied, the municipality used a bore-hole for its water supply, which is now thought to be empty.
Next-cheapest and possibly a greater bargain, albeit with fewer homes, is a village in the province of Almería – 78 kilometres from the city and beaches, and 150 kilometres east of Granada, but only six kilometres from the A-92N motorway; a snip at €190,000.
Five buildings, one of which is a garage, include three potential residential properties averaging 100 square metres on each of its two storeys – one, a small cottage, is completely renovated, but only has one double bedroom with a tiny bathroom; another, a large, unfinished family home within the structure of a traditional cortijo or farmhouse with a small, incomplete swimming pool and just under six acres of almond groves, and a third, a semi-detached house with a garden, patio and stable yard, four acres of almond trees, needing total renovation.
Two of the three are uninhabitable, but all are connected to the water and electricity supplies – albeit the larger two have no pipes or wiring.
Take a closer look at our second picture – the La Rioja village is shown in the top two shots and the Almería one in the bottom two.
Mid-priced villages for sale
Snap up a batch of 13 houses in the province of Cáceres in the far-western region of Extremadura, bordering onto the province of Salamanca (Castilla y León) for €300,000 – set in the heart of the Batuecas valley, these buildings all have planning permission and existing plans for 30 apartments, mostly of two bedrooms each. The work still needs to be carried out, at the buyer's cost, but the legal aspects are mostly covered – and you can extend your investment by buying additional batches of houses in the village for around €15,000 per property – 20 of them without plans and as yet uninhabitable, but with existing deeds, and another 40 on the property registry but with their deeds still pending, 10 with deeds on recognised brown-site land, and another 67 in three wider rural zones belonging to the same village which need major renovations, but have all the necessary paperwork. Each of the latter are well-connected by road, but mostly on narrow village streets difficult to get a car down – albeit oozing with character, made with sandstone brick and with slate roofs.
An eight-bedroomed house and a church, four townhouses of two storeys each requiring heavy renovation, a restored former school building and optional extras for an additional price – including garages, warehouses, a swimming pool, henhouses, recreation park with fixed barbecue areas, and 42 apartments needing major works – and six acres of land thrown in but with another 60 available for extra money, you can scoop up your own village in the eastern province of Cuenca, sandwiched between Valencia and Madrid, for €590,000. It's about four kilometres from the nearest large village, which has a pharmacy, health centre, food shops and bar, and around an hour by road from Cuenca city, famous for its 'hanging houses'.
As it's right on the rural tourist trail, the provincial government is offering a small grant to help pay for access roads and signposting, and planning is readily available to convert parts of it into rural guest houses, restaurants, car parking, spas, or to sell off chunks of it privately. Its potential as a visitors' or holidaymakers' country hotspot is huge, given its remote location, as there's practically no competition nearby.
Check these out in picture three – Cáceres at the top and Cuenca at the bottom.
Blow the budget: Multi-million villages
If you have a spare seven-figure sum kicking around, the world of empty hamlets is your oyster – and among the pearls nestled in it is a beautiful abandoned mining village in the far south-western province of Huelva, Andalucía, with a whopping 625 acres of land and buildings totalling 6,000 square metres which, once fully renovated, could be a cluster of luxury homes or a rural holiday complex. The location is ideal for creating a golf course – its on-tap water supply is perfectly sufficient for an 18-hole green – although planning permission would be needed. It could be yours for €2.1 million.
Or a rural complex of 14 houses with a spa, swimming pools, beauty salon, health centre and three-golden-fork restaurant, all fully equipped, within the boundaries of a nature reserve in the province of Granada comes in at just under €2.7m.
Or go straight to the top of the price list and pick up 988 acres of land with buildings that include a total of 19 double bedrooms, with heating and air-con, private and communal terraces and lounges, swimming pool and conference room, stables, warehouses, mechanical workshops, almond and olive groves and even an office and a windmill, all completely renovated, for €6.8m. At 90 kilometres west of the classical city of Salamanca, known as the 'Oxford of Spain', and not far from the Portuguese border, you can hop between two countries on day trips. Take a look at picture four for inspiration.
Why are so many empty villages for sale?
A European Union benchmark defining municipalities as 'abandoned', 'depopulated' or at risk of desertion or demographic demise is 11.5 inhabitants per square kilometre – and 53% of Spain's villages fall into this category.
To put it in perspective, let's use the example of the densely-populated, cosmopolitan coastal town of Jávea on the northern Alicante province coast, a haven for discerning holidaymakers and expats from every continent: home to 27,225 people year-round, according to the last census in 2016, that means each of its 68.59 square kilometres is home to just under 397 people. A town of the same land mass that fell under the 'depopulated' description would have just 789 inhabitants. Sticking with touristy locations, the Costa del Sol beach Mecca of Estepona (Málaga province), is even more densely populated: its 137 square kilometres are home to 66,683 residents, or nearly 487 per square kilometre, whilst an 'abandoned' village of the same surface area would have a mere 1,576 inhabitants. Moving away from the 'traditional' tourist trail, the southern Valencia province coastal town of Tavernes de la Valldigna – a favourite with Spaniards seeking summer beach breaks without the crowds, but largely undiscovered by northern European holidaymakers or expatriates – had 17,485 year-round residents on its census in 2016 occupying its 49.2 square kilometres, or 355 per square kilometre; the total population of a 'demographically-declining' town of the same area size would be only 566.
The high-altitude village of Albarracín in the province of Teruel is very widely spread out, over 452.72 square kilometres, with just 2.3 people living in each, or a total of 1,054 – about the same density as its near neighbour Cascante del Río, whose 32.38 square kilometres house only 74 residents.
'Abandoned' villages, or those at risk of future exodus, can even be found within a 20-minute drive of the most packed-out beaches in Spain: the Vall de Gallinera (northern Alicante province, fifth picture), scattered across a 53.6-square-kilometre valley in eight residential 'clusters' or hamlets, each with a different name, had 582 residents in 2016, or 10.9 per square kilometre.
These 'endangered' villages tend to be inland from the coast – even if they are in coastal provinces and only a few kilometres away from the nearest beach, are normally down winding, single-carriageway lanes, frequently mountain passes, making the distance in terms of driving time much longer – typically in remote, rural areas and, by default, idyllic, picturesque, peaceful and graced by clean, healthy air and an abundance of nature. Perfect for those seeking land for animals, or for a quiet weekend retreat, but not practical for everyday living: too far to commute comfortably to work or school, a long and arduous hike to the nearest shops and GP surgeries and even further from hospitals, and often with poor internet and mobile phone coverage, if any at all. With so few inhabitants, telecommunications companies are not willing to set up networks in these areas, as the number of customers using them means they will run at a loss. So, the mainstay of their economies tends to be agriculture, which is risky and often loss-making; those of working and child-bearing age move to more convenient areas, and the only ones left are retired. In a generation or so, these will have died out – if they haven't already moved to a place where they can easily reach medical services, home care and shops.
Given its sheer size, Spain is the most-threatened EU member State in terms of endangered villages, followed by Portugal where 23% of its territory suffers similar desertion.
And census figures show just how centralised Spain's residential hubs are: the 53% of 'threatened' municipalities are home to a mere 2.5 million people, whilst the remaining 44 million of the country's inhabitants live in the other 47% of towns, villages and cities.
Related Topics
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