A Valencia villa with a garden can be buried deep in the countryside, and termed a casa rústica, or form part of a housing development or urbanización.

Urbanizations along the Mediterranean coast can be divided into two broad categories – authorized and unauthorized.

Ayuntamiento (town council)

When you are buying a villa or plot of land you should be aware of the legal status of the surrounding urbanization. To discover this, you must enquire at the local town planning department or Urbanismo del Ayuntamiento.  At the same time, it is worthwhile examining the local planning maps such as the town plan, or Plan General de Ordenación Urbana, to find out whether any major developments are planned that could affect your property. If  language is a problem your legal representative can do this for you. Nowadays, it is vitually impossible to build on land that is not within an authorised urbanization.

If you are thinking of buying a villa on an urbanization where the houses look very similar to each other, then it was almost certainly developed by a single constructor and is almost certainly authorised.

This means it is a planned community which meets the standards of the various governmental agencies regarding the use of the land (residential, sports, commercial, and green areas). In this respect  it is providing a minimum level of services and quality control in the construction of roads, pavements, street lighting, sewage systems, electricity and water installations. Obtaining permission for an urbanization will usually take a developer many years and cost a great deal of money.

Unauthorised urbanizations

However, if you are looking to buy a villa on an urbanization where all the villas are different shapes, ages, and sizes, then it will quite possibly be an unauthorized urbanization. An indication that an urbanization is, or was, unauthorised, would be the obvious absence of paved roads.

From around 1975, many thousands of urbanizations were constructed in Spain without planning permission. These urbanizations were typically built by Spanish families as summer, or weekend, villas. No official blessing was sought, or given. Surprisingly, the various electricity, telephone, and water companies were usually persuaded to connect these houses.  Councils were often happy to turn a blind eye because illegal constructions enabled them to issue fines which were higher than the official fees for issuing building licences.

Legalising urbanizations

This state of free-for-all anarchy is gradually being brought under control and today the focus is on legalising these urbanizations. The speed with which this happens depends very much on the local council. Given the average Spaniard’s deep sense of respect for private property, it would be politically impossible for a council to propose destroying any of these villas unless they were exceptionally near to the coast or an important natural park.

As a first step to legalisation, the local council will probably re-designate the land where an urbanization stands from being rural (no urbanizable), to either buildable (urbanizable) or urban (urbana). The council will then consult with the resident associations and prepare a development plan or proyecto de urbanización, as well as a detailed map of the urbanization – known as plan parcial. This process will almost certainly take several years and will be paid for by all the homeowners, normally pro rata to the size of the plot owned.

When the plan is agreed and approved by the council, work will begin on implementing the plan and constructing surfaced roads, sewers, and street lighting. Again, this process will probably be implemented in stages over a period of several years and paid for by the homeowners.

Higher prices

In summary, authorised urbanizations offer the advantage that the infrastructure is already in place and paid for. However, prices are normally higher and as the villas are usually built by a single developer the properties will, almost inevitably, lack something in character and charm.

Unauthorized – or newly authorized – urbanizations are usually less expensive and offer a wider range of individualistic styles and sizes. The plots and subsequent gardens tend to be quite large. Yet, the homeowner should be aware that at some time in the future the necessary infrastructure will have to be built and paid for – either in cash installments or by raising a mortgage. The cost for installing the infrastructure will vary, according to the work involved, and probably depend on the size of your plot.

However, these improvements should mean homeowners will be benefit from a more than corresponding rise in the value of their villas.

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