You may have heard that the local agents association the LPA – The leading property agents of Spain held a real estate breakfast presentation earlier this week.
Plenty to unpack, I’ll do something more in-depth another day but for now, the main takeaway for me is that at some point next year there will be agent regulation implemented through Andalucia and one of the criteria is that agents need to be a member of an association like the LPA or similar.
Another spicy topic was news of a scary tax revenue-motivated government enforcement men in black hit squad from Madrid are cracking down on what they call falsos autónomos in the real estate industry, which simply put, are self-employed agents who should be employees. This affects a large number of agencies, the penalties are hefty and the solutions are murky at best. Will try to dig into a bit and offer some actionable tips.
They also discussed news with the Marbella urban plan saga, which is progressing but not there yet.
Sean Cannon from Panorama provided a very good market update, short of it is the outlook is still cautiously optimistic.
They covered the prickly topic of holiday rentals, nothing especially new there other than it’s a complicated mess Ask 3 lawyers and you’ll get 3 different interpretations.
Credit where credit is due, all in all a very positive LPA event and one where real steps forward are being discussed.
The tide is changing and the LPA appears to be much more open to accepting new members. Although might not seem to be a big deal, the very fact there was a session in English highlights this new, more inclusive approach. I’ll separately outline what the current requirement for membership is, and of course the benefits.
