Spain’s illegal homes overshadow minister's u.k. Sales pitch

Jose Blanco, Spain’s development minister, will try to persuade U.K. investors today to purchase unsold vacation homes in a country where more than 50,000 home buyers have lost the legal rights to their properties.

Blanco, 49, plans to promote the “strength” of Spain’s economy, the “transparency” of its housing market, and the “soundness” of its property legislation, according to an April 14 statement from the Ministry of Transport and Development. He will then deliver the same message during presentations in France, Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Russia.

The campaign follows renewed calls from European Parliament members including Marta Andreasen, Roger Helmer and Michael Cashman to freeze some of the funds the European Union gives Spain until it resolves legal shortcomings that have stripped once-legal buyers of ownership rights. A non-binding 2009 report by the parliament’s petitions committee criticized the country for applying restrictions on coastal property retroactively and showing “judicial laxity” toward corruption and speculation.

“It’s inconceivable that anyone would want to invest in property in a country that has shown itself to be lawless when it comes to property rights,” Andreasen, a member of the U.K. Independence Party, said in a telephone interview. “Andalusia has 300,000 illegal homes alone. If we extrapolate that to the rest of Spain, a million homes is a conservative number.”

Source: Bloomberg