It seems the Junta de Andalucia has decided that the homes being sold at discount prices do not reflect the "real price" so they made up their own and are sending back-taxes bills to dozens of new owners w late-fee charges! According to them prices are RISING (sic) in C. Esuri in 2011. Does anyone have/had this problem? Charges range from 500-4000€, so depending on the rate, a lawyer may not be the solution (talked to a person in the Ayamonte land offices who had the same problem and they ended up paying (after using all their professional contacts!)).

It has always happened. We bought 2 bank repos in 1996 and they would not accept the figure even though a bank had sold them. We had a few thousand more to pay. They also sting sellers by charging extra capital gains tax eg if you bought at 200,000 and sell for 150,000 they assume you are lying...it's la-la land.

Is it, the shoemaker has just sold his holiday home on the med. Andalucia I think at a loss of €200k. I expect he will get a bill for CGT on his notional gain as well!

We had a bill for €5000; the government said the apartment was worth something like €195000 even though we bought it from the bank for €125000. And prices went down after we bought; there are still 6 properties for sale so they could go down even more! We appealed, which didn't get us very far. We are now in the process of the next appeal stage. We had to obtain our own valuation which came out at €129000; this was based on 3 similar proprties and the average price per square metre was calculated and that figure was multiplied by the square metres of our proprty (according to the surveyor this is the accepted method of calculation). We submitted that to the government in June and haven't heard anything more yet but the surveyor and our solicitor both say that is probably because the government have been on holiday all summer. the solicitor did say we may need to obtain a further joint valuation in due course.

I can see why people just pay up if it is only a couple of hundred but for €5000 we thought it was worth a bit of a fight.

Kath

The Junta have a website which allows you to enter your Cadastral No. and then you can calculate the increase in value of your parcela. Since 2004 ours has gone up from €30k to €100k I think this is based on plot value and since god is not making anymore they think the only way is up! However a sale price depends on a willing seller and a committed buyer and there are not many of either at the moment so real prices could be anywhere. I do not believe the prices in Spain will stabilize until the Land Registry start to publish true sold prices each quarter as they do in UK. That would of course cause all sorts of problems for tax collection and the huge valuation industry that exists in Spain.

Have you got the link for that site please Kath?

I think this is the one you want: -

http://www.juntadeandalucia.es/econo.../valUrbana.jsp

Thank you.

Ayamonte minimum prices according to the Junta are got by Multiplying the catastral value by 3.7 .
It's not so bad when buying direct from the developer ( 1% of diff) but on resale it is hefty(a whopping 7%). I understood the reasoning behind it (min price) when the property prices were climbing all the time but now min price is way off.

see this about houses in spain

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15293808

We paid an extra 1800 euros when they re valued from 100,000 euros to 127,500. We bought from a bank so assumed, wrongly,that there shouldn't be any such issues. We are not there very often and didn't get the letters so we ran out of time to appeal, in the end we just paid the bill including a late payment fine.Sounds like we would have paid as much in survey and legal fees trying to fight it.

You try and do your bit for the Spanish economy and that's the thanks you get!!!

I have just been told I need to pay another 2,750 euros for exactly the same thing, I have appealed but that has been rejected and now I either pay or take them to court which including the extra survey I would need will cost around 1,000 euros and may still end up having to pay the extra tax. It does seem like a joke to me how they can get away with doing this when it is obvious that the current prices are correct as many properties are being sold at these lower figures!

You could try looking at it from a different point of view (eg mine and many other owners) I have to pay tax on the value of my property as valued when bought before the property crash. In theory it could be a property identical to yours - if you take the "current selling price" as the 'value' then you could be paying half the tax I am for the same thing. I think you might agree that this would not be fair either?
[Not to mention the losses I have sustained and the bargain that you have got.] Although I said I wouldn't mention them

It's a shame so many got caught at the peak of the boom, but the market price should be the base for taxes or value assessment. If you buy now, the prices are even lower than what we paid in April...
My question (thanks for all the responses) is whether ANYONE has won a case against the Junta on this extra-tax?

Yes theres 2 sides to every story!

I actually havent researched this - but from memory.... I thought taxes were based on the cadastral value of the property.

Theres also a declared value somewhere as well - that may (or not) be the same as the cadastral value.

Its possible therefore (if Im right) that the cadastral value when we bought 'expensively' - is greater than the price you paid 'cheaply'.. and the council is adjusting yours up... from your purchase price.

Does this make any sense? As I say I havent researched it.. and am not sure of any of this

Jon