You are going in the right direction with this advice, but you have to realise that Spain is already the eighth biggest economy in the world depite its relatively small population, so it is already "playing with the big-boys".

Manufacturing isnt Spain's strong point any more, just like it isnt for the UK, but Spain is a leader in green energy technology. Maybe not manufacturing the panels, but in the implementation of large scale green tech projects.

I agree with ivanmax in that the government need to take advantage of the talented and educated young people there are in Spain. Although I know plenty of succesful Spanish graduates, I also know those who work in shops or supermarkets or have no jobs at all, which is a huge waste.

Btw, around 30% of the Spanish workforce of 22million has a degree, of which 12% are unemployed, so this is around 700,000. Not quite "millions", but almost!

So do I, up to a point, but the problem is most here don't want to hear or believe it. They only want the good news. Talking up the market isn't going to make it happen though. He's right about the university graduates unemployed, large numbers are leaving to work abroad. Spain is investing, and investing heavily, problem is a lot of it is overseas, in places like Argentina and UK. Good for the companies, not so good for the Spanish labour force.

Thinking that's a bit high, I looked at a few lists, and whilst they all have different ways of measuring these things, I couldn't find Spain in the top 10. The best I could find was 12th

I'm not sure thats totally true. People dont have their heads buried in the sand ... well not all of them. Same here in the UK though to some extent. Ive spoken to quite a few people now who say the mood is pretty grim, with job loss risks ... and of course the property market is still pretty bad (at least it is in Birmingham). My daughter is concerned because of changes the government are making may affect her job in the health care industry

I tend to look at it in Spain in the long term, but I agree those that tried to make some dosh out of a quick turnaround are stuffed.

I think I got the 8th from the Spanish news

The World Bank ranks Spain as 9th, although the IMF has them 12th

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...y_GDP_(nominal)

I mean in this thread, comments like "Two doom monger threads about Spanish housing market ..........Must be a conspiracy."

Whilst a few viewings maybe up, I think it's hard to put a positive spin on the Spanish housing situation and see it as anything other than dire.

Much the same here, we have had out house on the market for several months now, quite a few viewings and interest, but nothing much is moving. Thankfully, we don't need to sell, just saw a few new builds that we fancied, but for anyone that needs to sell, it's not good. We can afford to stay put and tough it out. Mind you, if I look at the local weekly estate agents publicactions, they tell me they have sold, or have under offer, dozens of properties! Estate agents are never negative, are they?

I don't even need to guess... I suspect the answer is importing CHINESE goods from China..

Ahem...

I don't believe I did that!

8th ,12th or even 1st , it means diddly squat to millions who are in dire starights and cant pay the mortgages or put sufficient food on the table ,I`m sure statistical BS only infuriates the man in the street ,life is only really about you and your family`s situation regardless of how good the country is supposedly doing

Nobody here wants to hear/read the mishmash of rehashed opinions masquerading as news via Google or someone who has no connection whatsoever to Spain i.e. doesn´t live here, doesn´t work here nor own any property here.

That is why nobody is interested in what you say let alone believe it.

Given the paucity of members of this forum there would be no chance whatsoever of influencing anything let alone talking anything up.

Paucity, what a lovely word, and it reminded me of my own insignificance earlier today.

Having to visit one of those places of officialdom, I put on my best trousers and polished my shoes and even took a proper briefcase rather than the normal crumpled up, much copied copies of all those important papers in an old Mercadona plastic bag.

It worked at first, normally grumpy officialdom even managed a wry smile and things got done, but when I stopped on my way to the next visit to have a calming coffee in a small Spanish bar, my smart and foreign appearance suddenly upped the normal price of coffee by 50%.

I don’t know whether my unusual smartness had anything to do with it, but my house and dog insurance also increased at my next port of call.

My next effort at calmness took place in a large and noisy Spanish seafront bar, which had an excellent British trad jaz band playing (All That Jazz), while the adjoining Spanish bars were empty and at least fifty lookie-lookie men sat on the sea wall looking sad – the large bar was too busy for them to display their cheap wares to the happy customers.

The bill for two diet cokes and small tapas was horrendous, but I was quite happy to pay for all the jazz.

You don't have to live in Spain (or google) to know the spanish property market is dire/dead whatever. I think the UK is in for a tough year too but up to now I still see properties with sold on within a few weeks around the area I own. I know which country I would prefer to have money tied up in property, at least you can get good rental return in the UK.

Yes, the UK property market is much more resilient (especially in the SE) than that of the Spanish Costas. Simply because there is less uneployment, fewer empty places and wages are higher!

There is a rule of thumb you can use to work out if you are getting a good deal rental or house price wise.

Times the weekly rent by 1000 and you get the sale value. That works for the flat I own in London, but if I do that for the flat I rent in Spain it only gets to half the price the owner has it up for sale for!