bons

Me again. If I ever get to Portugal I promise I will help those who follow after as much as I can on this forum.

Has anyone bought land in Portugal? I'm loooking at buildable land, I know I can't build a house on rustic or agricultural land. If so, was it easy? Is it easy to get builders? Is it worth it? maybe just buying an existing house would be better.

Thanks in advance for your replies.

macliam

To me, "buildable land" suggests land that has a project approved by the local Camara... but projects are time-limited and very precise, so would only allow you to build exactly what has been agreed (all architectural plans etc. form part of the project). The alternative is buying land that has already been divided into plots and has access to the necesssary services (and there will still be constraints on what you can build and a need to get an individual project approved). I tend to ask myself why an approved project has not been completed, rather than seeing it as an advantage.....

The alternative is to buy an existing property for recuperation, but again, unless these are minor internal changes, you will require an approved project. The planning process in Portugal is a can of worms...... so unless you intend to dedicate your time to it, have several months (or years) free, speak good Portuguese (or are prepared to pay an agent) and are prepared to pay out a lot of money in fees and documents without any certainty of approval, I'd stick to buying a property that ticks your boxes with minor alterations.....

Moses2013

Ended up buying land in Spain instead of Portugal but the process is similar. These days you will find building companies that will cover the whole project including architects but I recommend to use your own, as that will reduce costs. Of course every area has different regulations but that's not hard to find out before you build/buy the land..

macliam

You have to be very, very careful. I used one of these companies. First they started to build before the project was approved, then the architect they used made assumptions about the local Camara that meant two applications were rejected, then the builder himself proved to be as trustworthy as Boris in a bordello. Three years later my building work is still incomplete as we are still going through a tribunal.

Moses2013

Like any company there will be good and bad and that's why one needs to do research. There are some good ones out there too, but we felt more comfortable picking our own architect. And with a modular build it's all done in the factory anyway, so you can see the work before it's delivered. Never sign anything for the house until the project is actually confirmed. At the end if the day it all comes down to price and every house was a new build at some stage. For us it was cheaper to buy the land and build + at the time when prices were low, we didn't have the deposit for a house.

macliam

To be clear - and this may only be true of Portugal and particularly of the Alentejo - the advice I have been given by various solicitors, architects and other people (local and not) in our three-year purgatory is that it is ALWAYS better to use local people, so they know the local requirements. This immediately precludes 90+% of any company you might look at..... the company I used had good credentials..... but, in retrospect, not in the type of build we required and certainly not locally. I probably had a list of about 2 builders who fitted the requirements in my locality - and they were unavailable.

Moses2013

The only person who really needs to know the local requirements is the architect. Any person can find out the local building regulations for the plot and the architect draws the plans that the building company has to follow. If it's a traditional build, it does make sense to go local or at least regional, otherwise the costs would go up and of course for the excavation work. If it's modular, it doesn't really matter and the only higher cost would be the delivery from factory to plot.

liveaboard

generally speaking, you're much better off if you find something already built and legal.
If [and this is a big if] everything goes well on a build, planning permission, finance, construction, inspections, you'll likely end up spending the same amount, or close to it.
Minimum time is a year. 4 years is a common time frame.
If there are any hiccups, you can be stalled for years or forever. Don't forget to factor in the time and stress of building a home.

On the other hand, if you buy an existing house you have what you're paying for as soon as the paperwork can be completed. That can still take time if there are any complications, but it sure is faster.
What's a year of your life worth? or 4 years?
I've built a few homes. I enjoy it and I'm good at it.
My recommendation is; don't.do it.
There are lots of homes for sale at any time, try to find one that suits your needs, where someone else spent those years of stress for you.
The bricks are cheap, the land is cheap, the value is in the habitation license.

Moses2013

Don't forget that you are talking about a traditional build. If it's modular, the only time spent on site is for excavation and then maybe 2-3 days for the build on site.
I agree that in Portugal you are probably better off buying an existing house, as there just aren't that many companies available yet and of course it's a smaller country than Spain.
But even buying an existing home, you will have a lot of challenges and might not see problems that already exist, unless somebody has the experience like you do. Yes, you can do a technical survey but try finding somebody who can do this in Portugal. You can only ask local builders and might end up having the same problems as macliam.

macliam

You keep speaking about "modular builds"...... but for this you will still need an approved project - which may not be possible in many municipalities in Portugal where the planning rules can vary from one Camara to the next. As an outsider, you would need to know whether a particular Camara is likely to approve a non-traditional build house - and quite often the answer you will get is "submit an application and see".... which is a costly exercise. The assumption in Portugal is also that you will use a building company, so that all relevant insurances etc. are covered - and you have to name them when you accept the approved project. This is why my build is stalled until I can remove (hopefully physically!) references to the conman who started work on it. One thing to bear in mind is that whilst you can sign all the contracts you like, the responsibility for any build remains with YOU as the owner, so if the builder bends the rules.... you pay. This is why I terminated the build once I lost confidence in the contracted builder. As liveaboard says, it's just not worth the hassle...

Moses2013

If you do your homework, it can certainly be worth it. It doesn't matter and modular (or call it prefab) just means it's not built on site, so if it has to have a traditional look, you make it that way. If they don't want steel, go for concrete or wood. If they want a concrete foundation it's no problem but your not spending months on a building site. First of all you can actually find out what will be approved before you buy the land, so I don't see a problem there.This type of foundation wouldn't be allowed where we are but other Camara might allow.
https://www.smartliving.cat/en/smartliving-home-eng/

These again go with traditional foundation

Modular in tradional option

As said before, if it wasn't worth it then no person would be able to buy a 2nd hand house. Every house was built at some stage and you certainly have more options today when it comes to materials. It's actually a lot harder to fix the previous mistakes, rather than avoiding them from the start.
Biggest challenge in Portugal is finding the land at a decent price.

Red Eric

Where's wellinever?

I know he's got some first-hand experience.

Lou71

I really like the look of that house! Seems like a good option if you can find a suitable plot in the right location.

What is the approximate cost per square metre?

wellinever

hi
Yes I have just finished building a house in the Algarve, having purchased an `urban` piece of flat land on an existing urbanisation. That was in late 2016.
This was a piece of land with no prior plans for it, other than it could be a single/double storey property up to T3, and with max 115m/2 footprint plus 50% more on first floor.
Thats a pretty normal situatoin, and in addition there are the limits of construction to all of the boundaries. But all of these are clearly written on the original `Planeamento` of the urbanisation. so its important before buying to check all of this with the council planners, an appointment will be needed and they are all very busy. (do not forget boundary walls as these can give problems if not correct on the project approved by the council). Can you have a swimming pool on the plot, if so what is the max size etc
Things were very different then, builders had no work, so easy to find and cheap, council had no projects they were looking at so could pass plans etc pretty quickly.
In the area that I am that has all changed since then. Now builders are like rocking horse **it, made even worse by CV-19. Councils are now taking months and months to give a building license, even an alteration to a plan will take months to go through. And dont even think about changing a build during construction even a change of window/door to the outside if an approval for an alteration has not been given.. So if you did go ahead one word of advice to save you a lot of money and time, s to ensure that your architect has done it exactly as you want, after approval only way to change is by alteration, and and that has a big cost to it (regardless of what the architect might say), and could hold you up for months.
All builders, in order to build a new house must have an Alvara, that means that they have all of the necessary qualifications/insurances to actually build. A project must contain their names and the names of the engineers and architects for all of the individual aspects of construction (gas/water/ electrics/engineering etc) . Similarly the architect.
So you cannot just get any old expat builder to build for you unless he has an up to date alvara.

Building in Portugal in my experience is no more or less frustrating thatn it would be in the UK, aprt from the fact that all builders thatg I nkow of take on too many houses and have virtually no retained staff, apart from general blokes, and the cheaper you get the less competent they tend to be. Today I reckon at the cheapest the cost is e1000/2m+IVA at 23% and that would not include a kitchen but would include all tiling up to about e15/2m for floor and wall.....but that goes a long way in Portugal. DOnt forget that any small changes inside that you make will be added to the final bill (all builders have a little notebook that they will produce at the end and say, ah, remember you wanted this moving or that changing....) but no different.to anywhere else.
So in short my own experiences with building in Portugal is that you get what you want where you want within reason, you get a new house, and you know what is in it and how it was built., modern specs in Portugal are now significantly higher than in the UK. You know the score from the minute you design the house and find a plot. My suggestion is to think about what sort of house you want, how big, and design something that you like......then calculate a price based on that, then hope hat you can find a piece of urban land that can accommodate your design and falls within your total budget. A builder and architect that speak good English of course is the best, but most important is that you can chat with the architect as they do all of the speaking with the town halls.
But you will have to have a lot of patience. Is it worth it? Yes and no, now its finished yes but during lost all of my hair, but you should end up with a property that costs much less than if you bought finished (but remember Capital gain when you come to sell it.)
Well thats my lot, any questions just ask

Moses2013

This company is in Burgos Spain but at least it gives some ideas. The concept is also based on mobile homes in this case
https://configurador.eurocasas.com/gran-villaEurocasa
These would be more modern and modules can be adapted



https://casasprefabricadascube.com/modelos/cube-100/