montgomail

Glad you like Oliva. Have you been to Gandia yet? It's a lovely town for shopping and sightseeing, (probably not so easy with small children) but if you get the chance, well worth a visit. And the beach is beautiful, pale sand stretching for miles.

keithwalters

The worst thing for me about living in Spain is the number of scooters that buzz around everywhere with complete disregard for other road (or pavement) users. And the number of stray/abandoned animals and consequent, sometimes very graphic, road kill everywhere.

Everything else is great!

So yes, for me the grass has been greener once we got here.

patsywhitehair

have to agree with keith, blinkin scooters can drive you mad. As for stray animals it seems that if you come to spain you will normaly end up with one or 2 of the stray animals. We found our pup just left near the bins and bought him home, you see the strays everywhere its horrible cos you cant help all.
But to get back to the point, we have been here for 9 months and to us the grass is greener here, lovely...... we absolutely love it, mind you have got to say that myself and partner dont have to work so that has a great deal to do with it. i think if you have to work in spain it could be a bit different. pat

PaulLes

I have to agree with a lot of what has been said in this quote, we live in a beautiful location, but litter tends to be the norm, we were out walking with an elderly Spanish guy in the summer on a road that divides our land, when i had finished the can of beer i was drinking i squashed the can and was in the process of putting in my pocket much to the dismay of our friend who was telling me to throw on my land. We have also had a casita rebuilt from a ruin, as we are not permanently living in Spain i decided to get local builders in (i am a joiner by trade) although the work was carried out quickly , the first fix standard is terrible, a case of what you can't see after doesn't matter.
You will hear constantly that you don't need cavity walls, or damp proof courses, despite most spanish houses having rising or penetrating damp.
We watched the new roof take shape, not using the old roman tiles but the interlocking modern equivalent. "much better they dont let the rain in". They bloody do, as you know we have had some pretty heavy rain lately, but unlike the UK were it drives in all directions and doesn't come through your roof in Spain it falls vertically even more reason for the tiles to be water tight. Our new roof had a few damp patches, which after a severe bollocking the builder sorted.
I had a look at the tiles and although they look like UK pan tiles they differ, UK tiles are tiled horizontally across the roof from the bottom up, lapping at the sides then the next row covering a third of the tile below and half lapped so that the vertical joint is in the middle of the row below.
Spanish tiles are tiled in vertical rows bedded in cement, to enable the next row to go on the top left hand corner has a square cut out so that they lap without lifting the the tile above to slip under leaving a barely concealed joint and water penetration in heavy rain. You would think that they would use a felt under layer as elsewhere in Europe, but again that to them this is strange idea.

It seems once you have your licence with every item from widows to earthmoving paid for thats it, even though it goes through the architects dept, no building regs, just a denunce if you over step the licence.

The ironic thing is most Expats inland would prefer an english builder, whereas a spanish builder throws up the work, bangs on the Yaso with a straightforward licence and little opposition a UK builder gets bogged down with Ayuntameinto red tape.
You will often hear the saying get Spanish builders in, UK builders are more expensive, i will leave you to figure out why?
A case for most Expats is that both finished jobs look the same until the rain.

Apart from my rant the grass is greener (must be the rain) and we love our place in Spain, Spain is a fairly new country since Franco, moving very quickly, trouble is much of the builders are from a different era,

Mitzyboy

As you´ve probably seen, we live in Oliva also on Tossal Gros. We´ve been here since 4th Octoberish and I can´t say I am dissapointed by anything so far other than my own inability to communicate properly. As I write, the weather is fine and sunny, and I can see the funny side of the internet cafe I am sitting in is called W H Smiffs.

The people have been very friendly and helpful, our next door neighbours have offered to help with anything and have been very kind.

I have even been stopped by the Guardia and not been threatened with having my english car confiscated as I was previously warned. In fact they could care less that it was a british car. My villa looks like Goonhilly Downs unfortunately as the only place they could put the 1.8 mtr dish was on the roof. This dish, by the way, is perfectly fine to receive SKY most of the day. Slight break on movies in the afternoon, and BBC goes off around 10 pm. BBC two does go off about 5 pm.

All in all I would say that so far Spain has been everything I expected. Sure. the first couple of weeks were very strange, but I have not felt too homesick and keep in touch with relations regularly.

Oliva is a lovely place. The more you walk around the streets the more you find hidden away in places. Have you been down to Els Poblets yet? Thats a nice little place. Denia is excellent also, especially for a night out or Gandia Playa. Especially as a lot of restaurants around Oliva are a little unreliable at this time of year.

jdr

Spanish tiles are just decoration over a cement roof with hopefully either a felt or sprayed membrane for the waterproofing

Lynn R

I have to agree with you about the litter problem, and also dog mess, pooper scooping obviously hasn't caught on in Spain yet! One expat I was talking with about the litter issue, who has lived in Spain for 30 years, put forward a novel theory as to why the Spanish people seem to have such a cavalier attitude towards it - she said that until comparatively recently practically everything they threw out would have been biodegradable as modern indestructible plastic packaging wasn't available, plus there was no real refuse disposal system in place especially in the villages. So the culture was very much for people just to literally open their doors and fling stuff into the street - and they're still doing it!

I haven't had any of the building problems you describe, mine is an old house which seems very solidly built and we've never had any problems with roof leaks even in the worst of weather. Maybe it's the modern trend to throw up jerry built buildings with no real regard for quality, which goodness knows isn't confined to Spain - think of all the Council flats built in the 60s and 70s which have already had to be demolished as they weren't fit to live in, when they flattened perfectly solid terraced houses by the acre to make way for tower blocks, when they would probably still be going strong now if some money had been spent to upgrade them.

jdr

Glad you made it and are settling in, I am sure you will really enjoy it.
Don`t try to rush things, just adapt to the Spanish way

Mitzyboy, dont take your car for granted, they now have your number

I saw a car carrier the other day with about 8 4x4`s on and guess what ?
all UK plates, perhaps they suss out a lorry load first when they are short in the police funds.

billgates

Speaking of British builders - we live in Otivar where it seems that if you can't afford to retire you just set up as an independent builder. It doesn't matter that you were a taxi driver, car mechanic, shop assistant or whatever back in the UK, simply moving to Spain automatically qualifies you to set up your own building company. As long as you can do a bit of diy then you're perfectly qualified to build two-storey houses.

Is the grass greener? What grass? Oh, you mean the golf-courses of course.

Seriously though, the novelty of a warmer climate quickly wears off. We've been living here for a couple of years now and still find it very frustrating trying to get simple things done. The laid-back lifestyle? Maybe if you're retired or just don't need to work, even then the retired friends of ours constantly complain of being bored and have to find jobs to keep them busy.
Jobs - we know maybe one non-spanish person that has managed to get a job with a spanish company. The rest just get cleaning or gardening jobs for the more fortunate expats. Of course, if you're able-bodied then you just set up as a builder.

I think I maybe wore those rose-tinted glasses at first. We're comfortably well off even though we're not retired and I'm not a builder, and don't plan on going back to uk any time soon. However, I miss a decent Tesco or Sainsbury's and a good local pub. Then there are those certain items you want but just can't seem to get over here. And the scooters. And the litter. And the smoking. And the rude attitude from some Spanish towards foreigners. And plonking your change down on the counter even though you have your hand held out. And the fact that everything shuts down at 2pm on Saturday and doesn't open again until Monday morning.
Other than that it's a lovely place in the winter even though my house was built without any wall insulation at all and I have to have the wood-burner going all day. I look forward to the Spring. Summer is a bit too hot for me.

Would I move back to the Uk? Well, not just yet, and anyway, with the state of house prices back there I wouldn't be able to afford to buy a house.

mikelincs

We have friends who asked us who had done our glassed in terrace, we told them, and said we very very satisfied with the work. They ignored our recommendation and went with some people who were doing one down the road. I think they are regretting it now, work that would have been done in a couple of days took 4 weeks, as the builder kept disappearing to do other jobs, seems he had several on the go at the same time, would do a bit on one, then go and do some on another and so on. Eventually they had to threaten him with getting another builder to complete the work and taking that cost off what they owed him. The fact that he hadn't finished the job they first saw him doing, and it was now 4 months later just might have struck warning bells, but... Anyway, in the rain we just had, their now terrace cover leaked like a sieve, and the water couldn't get away, so they had floods. When they told him he said he would try and get back to them soon. They weer upset by this to say the least and started making legal threats. He has 'cured' it, but they are waiting for the next rain to prove it. Best way to find a decent builder is by word of mouth, we use a Belgian one, the problem one was British.

maryfhickey

Please keep writing. I am about to retire, and I am trying to persuade my new boyfriend that life in Spain among the Brits is th best. I am American, and I know aoubt having lived in Saudi Arabia where all Westerners would have perished without expat Brits.

Honeslty, do you still like it? What do you miss?

gallerie9

I miss my kids and family, but they come for holidays, and i can chat to them daily, we didnt see them much in the UK only for a few hours a week or two, so when they come its a long period.

I miss nothing else at all.

On the builders thing up a few post

We used a Spanish building firm. local men, we had hassle with the licences, but that is away of life in Spain it is how the councils earn there money, not paying large rate bills as in the UK. We had no more trouble than our spanish neighbours they had to have all the same as we did, any building work has to have a licence even if you are painting the out side. I know we had no different treatment than our Spanish friends, as only a few Weeks ago a spanish person was working with out the licences and she got into big hassle and a house across the way from ours was stopped two years ago for not complying with the regulations, and fined heavily, and up to now no work is taking place.
Spanish builders who worked on our house are first class the work is really good and well from the builders labourer up wards we had great service, and the trades people again not a complaint to be had the builder merchant is a star and the carpenter a woman has great pride in her work and the beams are a credit to her, we cant complain.
I know that I was riped off more than once in the UK and we had a extension on our house years ago and the builder kept going away to do other jobs, we didnt have that once in Spain not in the whole 4 months and the men, well they are great not once did they say we cant do that, any thing my other half wanted they did, with out a word of discontent.
We are more than satisfied