Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

I have always fancied a home in Greece or Spain when I retired but all you get on the news here is ex pats struggling to live and all trying to get back to the UK, for people living there is it as bad as they say, like to hear from people actually living there.

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

Everyone is probably in a different situation. I know many who are happy with their choice to live in Spain, they have a great social life and enjoy the warmer weather for 9 months of the year, the least said about the winter months the better. But also I would say that more than 50% of my friends and aquaintances have returned to UK in the last 3 years. Many had been here for more that 10 years and they were more able to realise that things were not the same any more.

I need to return to UK due to my change in circumstances. My OH died last year and basically I cannot afford to live here any more. I have been trying to sell up for 9 months now with my property at a price that is certainly not overpriced. I have had 2 potential buyers unable to get the mortgage they expected and have not been able to buy.

I notice that there are more businesses closing now than opening. Most of those that opened as new businesses last year have not managed to succeed. It may be different in other areas but I do not see so many packed bars at lunchtimes where previously workers would always congregate after finishing work at 2pm. Evenings are much quieter too and more people are asking for the Menu del dia when before they would order off the normal menu.

I find that my friends and I spend more time discussing which supermarket is best for which product, rather than where we will be going out to at the weekend. Fuel prices are so high that whereas once I would think nothing of driving to Gibraltar or for a day in Marbella, I look at the bus times and have a half day in Malaga. Utility prices are high, especially a phone and broadband package, that is if you can receive broadband at all.

Yes things are not as they were 3 years ago, but then neither is it the same in UK from what I read in the papers and my family tell me. I will return to UK as soon as I am able because I have family there and I am getting older and want a safety net. I want to know I can go to the doctor without worrying about a translator and I want to be able to go to a library, instead of constantly buying second hand books. But saying that, I am glad I came to Spain and unless you give it a go you will never know. However, as much as I like Greece I would not have moved there.

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

Spain is a good place to have money. Not a place to make money.

If you can live with that, you'll love it. Otherwise, you'll end up back in the UK.

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

If you are retired and have a decent pension then Spain is great.

UK pensions are increased in line with inflation which is usually higher than Spanish inflation.

I have loads of retired expat friends and they are all very happy. In fact the only person I know who has returned to the UK was in a casket!

The exchange rate has now improved by about 10% over the last few months so there is more money available to spend.

There is no way on earth I would return to the UK - even in a casket.

The majority of people returning to the UK are people who made the mistake of assuming they could make a living in a country where they don't speak the language and unemployment is the worst in Europe.

Of course there are exceptions to this - some people have made a success of working in Spain and there are some people who for very personal reasons who have made the move back to the UK - but they are few and far between.

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

Hi Matt, You've been sorely missed.

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

My OH and I have been here 8 years now and although the exchange rate at the moment is quite good it is nowhere on a par to what it was 8 years ago. Having said that, with two state pensions and two Local government pensions we believe we live far better here than we would in the UK Our rates (is it Community Charge now?) are €420 per annum, the maintenance charge for the garden and pool is €300 pa plus the refuse collection charge and water rates but altogether they no way equate to what we were paying in the UK 8 years ago.

All in all we feel so much better off here, both health wise, a far better social life and of course the weather. 31 degs in the shade on the balcony today for example.

Yes there is a lot of unemployment, house sales are at a low and many Brits have gone back to the UK, but for a variety of reasons. Missing family, not confident in the health system here, especially for after care for serious illnesss. We have experienced serious illness here and can only speak highly of the in hospital treatment that we received. No work but that I believe applies to younger families with children rather than pensioners.

Looking round the town there are many shops empty with either for sale signs or for rent signs in the window and the same applies to private property - it's a buyer's market if you have the cash.

As has been said many times on this forum. Come over, rent somewhere or stay in a hotel possibly and find out feet on the ground so to speak. Everybody has different views but from my part I love it and have no desire to return to the UK

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

Nowhere is very nice if you don't have money to live comfotably

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

Hello!

There is no comparison between Spain and Greece, because are very different cases. What did the Greek government was a real dirty trick that was living beyond their means, deceived the European Union with falsifying accounts

In Spain is different. Certainly we would have a crisis, but has deteriorated somewhat because these last 8 years we have had a socialist government that has ruined the country. It is the second time it happens, and is that in Spain there are people who do not learn, not understand that the socialism, at least in Spain, is equal to ruin. We can not take our own measures for out of the crisis because we are in the Euro zone, which also means that our currency is the Euro, then can not devalue

Certainly this is not our best moment, but Spain is not Greece. Nor politically, socially, economically, infrastructure, etc, this is not Greece. What happens in Greece is very complicated

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

Personally I think there is every comparison.
Dirty tricks and falsification is the Spanish national sport.

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

Agree, they both share similar problems, corruption on a huge scale and huge numbers not paying their taxes.

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

And which is the national sport in the UK? Your country is perfect? ​​Have not you done anything? Is it clean? Do you have that certainty? Do you have the certainty that you have a system of transparency that does not hide of the British people no corruption case? None?

I'm annoyed with those outbursts of honesty and arrogance that is in the Pyrenees to Scandinavia, with regard to Spain. Of course, my country is not perfect, but has nothing to learn of the Europe of the two world wars

The problem is that we are 47 million Spanish, including all kinds of people there. So I ask which is the perfection of the Pyrenees to Scandinavia ... When France dump trucks of fruit? When Germany ignored the protocols and accuses Spain of a disease in vegetables? When UK hides a terrible disease to the continent (mad cow disease)? When a swedish company converted a spanish nature park in a dump, and not pay nor a Eurus of compensation that is required, etc etc etc ... And this not to mention the amount of tax havens that is in the Pyrenees to Scandinavia ... And then people talk of fraud and corruption in Spain. Deporable

Hopefully when we get out of this misfortune (and I say hopefully, because I'm not very optimistic, I hate the Spanish political class, is always the same people) we have a government less friend of its neighbors, and better with the Spanish people. Because then come the stabbing: foreigners who in Spain benefits from our health system, or Argentina, a country to which we help with thousands of millions of Eurus in 2001, and then what happens happens. And more examples, as the examples that I have mentioned in the previous paragraph

What I want in a government for Spain? Less goodism and less politically correct outside of Spain; less complex; and defend what is ours, because it seems that in this Europe we are not surrounded of neighbors, only vultures :)

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

No idea

Why should I know?

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

France and Spain had mad cow diesese a long time before Britain but just ignored and hid the facts, France still does have it.

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

sheesh, and I'd been led to believe that stuff was only possible in the USA.
Learn something new every day...

Re: Is Spain really as bad as they say
 

I agree with anonimouse... Nowhere is a nice place in life really unless you are financially stable. Most people who do not have money just accept existence and just moan and groan about everything, everybody and everywhere else. Where as people with financial stability just sit back and mind there own business and live comfortably. You get out of life what you put in all this talk about recession and no money no where is aload of BS if you ask me because there is plenty of money out there and for anybody who makes the move to Spain or anywhere else if they put the work in have a positive attitude and do NOT treat it like a holiday can't go wrong if u ask me. The problem with us Brits is most of us are to bone idol and ignorant to learn new languages and try new things.