10k Holiday Home?

kweeveen86

Apologies if I'm putting this in the wrong area but it could have many suitable homes!

I saw the ITV show '10K Holiday Home' for the first time last night and it got me to thinking if it's really feasible? And if you just remove the word 'Holiday' then it'd be foolish to ignore the possibilities.

Small houses in need of TLC and upgrades in Spain and Portugal. What's not to love?! I, for one, would happily relocate given the state of thic country and the ever-worsening rental crisis.

Question is - where would you find a reputable estate agent to help you source such a property? So many scams out there. Who to turn to for guidance and assistance?

Baybay

I haven’t seen the programme but as I understand the premise, a small, run down property is bought & the buyer renovates it to a livable standard. I’m not sure if everything from purchase to renovation is carried out for 10k.
In my opinion, the first question is if you speak Spanish or Portuguese. If not, it may very well be considerably more complex than a tv show suggests.

kweeveen86

I do speak Spanish, yeah. I lived in Spain for 2 years a few years ago. A bit rusty at this stage but would get back into the swing of things quickly.

The TV show isn't strictly on a 10k budget but there or thereabouts. My budget would be a hugely extravagant 30k or so

uck51js9zml2yt

kweeveen86 wrote: »

I do speak Spanish, yeah. I lived in Spain for 2 years a few years ago. A bit rusty at this stage but would get back into the swing of things quickly.

The TV show isn't strictly on a 10k budget but there or thereabouts. My budget would be a hugely extravagant 30k or so

Just watch the series. She's in the middle of knocking some walls down

The_Conductor

Honestly- you're a couple of years late.
You'll have as much difficulty trying to find tradesmen in Spain or Portugal these days- as you have in Ireland.
A lot of the low lying fruit has already been picked.......

However- there are lots of good websites to trawl through- which do throw up gems from time to time (obviously, as anywhere- location is key).

For example:

http://servihabitat.com/svhPortal
http://www.comprarcasa.com/
http://www.idealista.com/
http://www.tucasa.com/
http://www.ventadepisos.com/
https://www.nestpick.com/

(there are loads of others).

Note- if you're buying in Spain or Portugal- the buyer pays all the taxes and fees- typically a minimum of 30% of the sale price (up to 50%- a much higher percentage accrues the lower the price of the property). You also have to take realistic annual property taxes into account, water rates (at a cost recovery basis- none of the low rates we had in Ireland) etc etc.

I'd also strongly suggest you rent in any areas you're interested in for at very least a couple of months- to get a feel for the area- before taking the plunge and buying.

Personally- I'd be more inclined to consider Portugal than Spain (and I have reasonable Spanish and Portuguese).

Arthur Daley

The_Conductor wrote: »

Note- if you're buying in Spain or Portugal- the buyer pays all the taxes and fees- typically a minimum of 30% of the sale price (up to 50%- a much higher percentage accrues the lower the price of the property).

Whoa 30-50% in taxes/fees. No wonder some of the prices look decent. But add another 30-50% on and they may not be much better than rural parts west of the shannon.

10pennymixup

Arthur Daley wrote: »

Whoa 30-50% in taxes/fees. No wonder some of the prices look decent. But add another 30-50% on and they may not be much better than rural parts west of the shannon.

There's probably a guy right now in Portugal sitting in a house that he pays too much rent for.
Drinking a glass of red, drooling over the photo's of a little "rundown" farmhouse in north Mayo on Daft.ie. A place that needs just a little "TLC".

DivingDuck

The_Conductor wrote: »

Personally- I'd be more inclined to consider Portugal than Spain (and I have reasonable Spanish and Portuguese).

I'd be interested to hear your reasoning for that, if you'd be willing to share it.

Samuel T. Cogley

If you want to live in Spain's equivalant of rural Leitrim go for it!

PokeHerKing

DivingDuck wrote:

I'd be interested to hear your reasoning for that, if you'd be willing to share it.

Better healthcare system for one.

The_Conductor

DivingDuck wrote: »

I'd be interested to hear your reasoning for that, if you'd be willing to share it.

Extremely good healthcare system
Portuguese is a lot easier to speak/understand- than Spanish
The people (in general) are nicer
The climate- is normally a little more temperate than Spain (of course this depends on where you are)
No development levies like Spain has

Few major downsides- tax in Portugal is higher (esp. on groceries etc- which is why so many Portuguese do their weekly shop in Spain)

Tourists (of course this is everywhere- incl. Ireland)

Particularly in rural areas- a glacial pace of life- which can be infuriating (esp. if you're actually trying to do something)

All-in-all- you really have to visit a long and varied selection of areas- ideally at various times in the year- to try and get a feel for what suits you.

Personally- I find it a lot easier to communicate with Portuguese people- than Spanish- and I find it simple to read Portuguese. This is after spending two years doing a diploma in Spanish as part of my degree........... Even when I have trouble- its simple to revert to French as a common second language even in remote areas.

DivingDuck

The_Conductor wrote: »

Extremely good healthcare system
Portuguese is a lot easier to speak/understand- than Spanish
...
Particularly in rural areas- a glacial pace of life- which can be infuriating (esp. if you're actually trying to do something)

All very informative, thank you! It's interesting that you (and another poster) mention healthcare because from what I had heard (zero first-hand experience, just repeating what I heard from a friend who had a family member fall ill in the country and it went very badly) it was below the standard of even the HSE.

Had no idea people considered Portuguese to be easier to learn than Spanish! The slow pace of life is probably an issue in Spain and France as well, to be fair, especially in the more rural areas.

L1011

The Portuguese pace of life is an odd one - I've had reason to go to a back arse of nowhere town in Portugal for a few years now. Its the main market town for a big rural area with all the shops, banks etc. On weekends one pharmacy of the three opens on a rota - on Sunday that means it opens from 2 til 10.

You try finding a pharmacy open in rural Ireland on a Sunday at all, let alone until 10pm! Otherwise however there is feck all open. There will always be one pharmacy, one shop, one filling station or whatever open but often only the one.

And yes, French is more common as a second language for anyone over 30 in Portugal. It seems they started teaching English as the second language to men before women weirdly - some idea about engineering professions needing it or similar.

fergal.b

Was ment to be on this program this Thursday night with my boat project but now it looks like virgin media are taking over 3 on Thursday and the show is gone




.

Sleepy

Are you sure you're thinking of the same programme fergal.b? This one is an ITV production? We binged the first 3 episodes last night on the ITV player and looking at air dates, it'd appear the next episode should be on tonight?

As usual with these programmes, I think a lot of the opportunity to do these things comes down to having resources the average working person with a family doesn't have: loads of time when you don't need to be working, tradesmen friends who'll do hundreds (or thousands) of euros worth of work for a cup of tea, a large workshop space (and already owning the tools), friends / family or contacts that happen to have barns full of odds and ends that are just waiting to be re-purposed (or having the space to build up a collection of such stuff yourself for a decade or so) etc.

I checked the village the host purchased her property in and it's 3 1/2 hours away from the nearest airport so not exactly conducive to taking regular long weekends to: between the flight and the drive you'd be the guts of a day getting to / from it.

It's a nice dream, and were I still in my early 20's with no family to support yet with my current mindset regarding the idiocy of pissing half my salary away going out the lash every weekend etc. I'd heavily consider saving up 20 or 30k and taking a year out to do such a project but for most of us with mortgages to pay and kids to raise, I fear it's fantasy stuff that we can only really dream of doing in our retirement years.

fergal.b

Sleepy wrote: »

Are you sure you're thinking of the same programme fergal.b? This one is an ITV production? We binged the first 3 episodes last night on the ITV player and looking at air dates, it'd appear the next episode should be on tonight?

Yep I'm on itv tonight at 7:30 but I cant record it thats why I was watching it on TV3 , now it's gone from 3 the news is on instead. The crew were with me for two days last year filming.

Sleepy

Ah, didn't realise that TV3 were showing it.

I'm not sure about the legality of it, but as it's available on the ITV Player it'd be a simple enough matter to record it with screen capturing software. Can't see how it'd be any different than the legality of using a VHS recorder to record live TV though!

fergal.b

Sleepy wrote: »

Ah, didn't realise that TV3 were showing it.

I'm not sure about the legality of it, but as it's available on the ITV Player it'd be a simple enough matter to record it with screen capturing software. Can't see how it'd be any different than the legality of using a VHS recorder to record live TV though!

I can't get ITV player to work as I'm in Ireland



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The_Conductor

fergal.b wrote: »

I can't get ITV player to work as I'm in Ireland



.

I thought we all used VPNs here? Aside from any other reason- Netflix is a hell of a lot cheaper- if you take it out from a Mexican IP address

HeidiHeidi

Jaysus, is there ANY way of (legally) watching this?


I'm out tonight when it's being aired, can't record ITV on Sky, tried the ITV player but that's UK only, you can upgrade to "Hub+" whatever that is but turns out you need a UK credit card :mad:


All I want is to see Fergal's boat......

(ETA, I see I crossed a couple of posts.....I've used Hola in the past, but am being scared off by tales of malware/viruses from using it.....)

AlmightyCushion

The_Conductor wrote: »

I thought we all used VPNs here? Aside from any other reason- Netflix is a hell of a lot cheaper- if you take it out from a Mexican IP address

Do you pay for it when you're staying at your €10k holiday home in Mexico? :pac:

uck51js9zml2yt

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Do you pay for it when you're staying at your €10k holiday home in Mexico? :pac:

Now we know where mods get their supply of "coke" from;)

pete4pool

Just seen this week on ITV and watched the first 4 episodes on the ITV player. Must say its a great show with a great idea. But as many have said above, it looks alot better on camera then it would in real life. 

She has 10k, but she will end up spending 12k, which is 13.5k euros and she not including the flights and car hire and accommodation, boat for max and his van, so by the looks of it, would be well into 3k already, if not 5k. And also with the amount of time spent, any of us be doing well to keep her project under 25k euro. 

Which is still cheap for Holiday Home in Portugal, but again, the end product, its in the middle of nowhere with very little to do other than hill walking. Realistically its not much of a holiday, esp if you under 40. 
But I have still spent the last 2 days searching the web for houses under 20k and have 30k burning a hole right now. I think a better option might be Bulgaria. Studio apartments under 10k euro there walking distance to the beach in a complex. Looks very good, only down sides are a longer flights and not sure about Bulgaria?
Anyone with experience of Bulgaria and buying property out there? Would you?

uck51js9zml2yt

pete4pool wrote: »

Just seen this week on ITV and watched the first 4 episodes on the ITV player. Must say its a great show with a great idea. But as many have said above, it looks alot better on camera then it would in real life. 

She has 10k, but she will end up spending 12k, which is 13.5k euros and she not including the flights and car hire and accommodation, boat for max and his van, so by the looks of it, would be well into 3k already, if not 5k. And also with the amount of time spent, any of us be doing well to keep her project under 25k euro. 

Which is still cheap for Holiday Home in Portugal, but again, the end product, its in the middle of nowhere with very little to do other than hill walking. Realistically its not much of a holiday, esp if you under 40. 
But I have still spent the last 2 days searching the web for houses under 20k and have 30k burning a hole right now. I think a better option might be Bulgaria. Studio apartments under 10k euro there walking distance to the beach in a complex. Looks very good, only down sides are a longer flights and not sure about Bulgaria?
Anyone with experience of Bulgaria and buying property out there? Would you?

If you need something to do with your money I'll send you my bank details

PokeHerKing

pete4pool wrote:

Anyone with experience of Bulgaria and buying property out there? Would you?

Property in Bulgaria, the BOOM is definitely back baby!:D

pete4pool

PokeHerKing wrote: »

pete4pool wrote:

Anyone with experience of Bulgaria and buying property out there? Would you?

Property in Bulgaria, the BOOM is definitely back baby!:D

Oh look the misery brigade are out. 10k house, I am the envy of the country.

Sleepy

Anyone watch the final episode? To say the finish was poor would be an understatement.

Max McMurdo sometimes has interesting ideas and can be quite clever in how he uses salvage but he either put feck all time into it or isn't much use at DIY! It wasn't even a matter of budget, some off-cuts and a can of paint could have created a shaker effect panelling on the wall beside the stairs instead of the bare MDF, the stairs itself was begging to be properly sanded, the "innovative" bare pipe tap needed a bend in the spout to reduce the likelihood of soaking the floor, the "pull out" counter looked like it needed a lot more sanding / waxing to get it to work smoothly (and I'm sure the same was true of the stools). Lots of the tiling looked fairly poorly done too.

It's a shame because none of the above would have added to the budget (aside from perhaps a €15 can of wood paint). To be fair, maybe attempting to complete the work in time to meet their filming schedules took it's toll on the finish and Julia Bradbury and her partner are intending to add a little polish to it in time but I thought it was very underwhelming.

fergal.b

I wouldn't fancy towing his caravan over any bumps in the road looks very close to the ground.





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Sleepy

Wouldn't fancy being out in a strong wind in it either!