What are the charges for buying a property in Sotogrande?

Becoming the owner of property in Sotogrande is very much ‘the dream’ for great numbers of people from around the world – and presumably for you too, if you are reading this.

But it is also crucial to be realistic and informed about the costs involved when you come to buy a house in Sotogrande, not least because it is not only the ‘headline’ price in the property listing that you will need to account for.

Don’t forget the mortgage as a would-be Sotogrande property buyer!

Naturally, if you will require a mortgage in order to bring a Sotogrande home within your financial reach, it will be necessary to plan carefully for this.

Presuming you intend to use the property as your main residence, you can generally expect banks in Spain to offer you 80% of the value of a property in the country, which will leave you needing to have 20% of the property’s value already saved up for use as a deposit.

But as we have recently written about, you may need to have a deposit closer to 30% to 40% of the property’s value. Looking to the other extreme, while 100% mortgages are not unheard-of in Spain, they only tend to be offered in quite exceptional (and not very favourable) circumstances.

What other charges can you expect if you do buy a house in Sotogrande?

Alas, whether or not you will need a mortgage in order to afford your Sotogrande property purchase, you will still need to account for the various other costs associated with a Spanish home purchase, including the likes of taxes and notary costs.

You can generally expect such additional costs to add the equivalent of about 10% to 12% of the headline property price, so it is important to have such funds set to one side.

As for what exactly those additional costs are, whether the house in question is newly built or second-hand, you will need to consider the services of the notary – who fulfils the role in Spain that a solicitor would in a house purchase transaction in the UK, for example. Prices for this service tend to be between €600 and €875, depending on the value of the property.

There are Land Registry costs, too – amounting to a further €400 to €700, approximately. This allows for the deeds that have been signed by the notary to be registered.

A slightly more complicated process to work out, is the tax you will need to pay on your Sotogrande property purchase, as this will depend on the home’s exact price and whether it is new or pre-owned.

Essentially, when you buy a house in Sotogrande that is brand new, you will be required to pay both AJD and IVA (the latter the Spanish VAT) at the Andalucia rate of 1.2% and 10% respectively. As for when you are acquiring a pre-owned home in this part of Andalucia, you will be expected to pay the region’s Property Transfer Tax (ITP) rate of 7%.

Our online portal can be your first point of reference when you seek Sotogrande property

Naturally, the above tax rates will be liable to change over time, and may be out of date by the time you read this. We would therefore always urge you to seek out the latest information when you are trying to figure out the exact amounts of money you will need to save for your home purchase here.

So, now that you have a good (albeit broad) idea of the various charges associated with the process of buying a house in Sotogrande – and it is important to note the above is not necessarily exhaustive – what should be your next step?

We would humbly suggest browsing our latest listings right here at Property Sotogrande. Our online property portal brings together listings from multiple respected estate agents catering to this part of Spain, which makes it an excellent place to start your search for your dream Sotogrande home.