Dear Madam,


As you mention in your query, the Building Act, Law 38/99 forced self-developers to attain the compulsory ten year building guarantee themselves. This had a cost of approx 6,000€ for a 90m2 dwelling. Failure to comply resulted in the self-developoer being unable to sell on the property whilst alive to another party unless the latter expressly waive this requisite on signing the Title deed. After the 10 years had elapsed you were free to sell on the property to anyone you wished without legal constraints.

Due to all the practical problems this caused, an amendment was brought about on by Law 52/2002 of 30th December 2002, additional disposition number two, which would be enforceable as from the 1st January 2003. This resulted in the exemption of self-developers that built just one dwelling for their own use to apply for the 10 year building guarantee.

Having said this, only some people may qualify for this. As it would be a legal loophole that many could follow to build & sell X properties waiving the compulsory guarantees devised for the protection of puchasers.

It seems your developer has in fact gotten away with it. Your case is one of the above that I highlight that ought to have the 10 year building guarantee as you are not self-developers yourselves. your developer has probably saved himself a great deal of money and hassle on doing so.

This guarantee is only available on building the dwelling, not after, for technical reasons I will not get into.

Did you hire a lawyer to act on your behalf on the conveyance?

Yours faithfully,
Raymundo LarraĆ*n Nesbitt