Neighbour has rented out our property abroad without permission!

[unsurebut]

My father has a property in Spain. It's been in the family since the 70s as a holiday home. Until 3/4 years ago my father travelled there regularly and the place was occasionally used by other family. Then my father had a catastrophic stroke and wasn't able to travel for a while and the place wasn't used as much.

The neighbour there offered to keep an eye on the place in return for his family being able to stay there on the odd weekend/couple of weeks in the summer. He's a nice guy and has done a lot to modernise the property. My father then gave him permission to rent out the flat when it wasn't being used, again, for the odd weekend / couple of weeks in the summer, nothing permanent or long term and we were to be kept informed about who was staying there and when in advance of it being rented out.

Fast forward to this year and my father has recovered enough to travel. We've booked to go there in June, all very excited. My father emailed the neighbour, only to be told that it's not possible because he's rented the property out until January! Not only is this not permitted, we weren't even told! I am absolutely outraged and my father is very cross. He's emailed the neighbour to say that we will be arriving on said dates and that's non-negotiable, the neighbour has replied to say that he's away this week so will respond next week. Meanwhile, flights have been booked, all on the assumption that we were to be notified in advance of it being rented out.

There's communication between my father and the neighbour referring to the agreement, but no specific contract or anything, and the arrangement has worked well until now. I think what has happened is that the neighbour has become used to us not using it and has been renting it out far more than we were aware.

So what do we do now if he refuses to get the 'tenants' to leave?! Surely their contract with the neighbour is null and void because he doesn't have permission to rent it out on this basis? The neighbour DEFINITELY knows this.

AIBU to demand the people leave so we can use the flat as and when we want?

As someone who has been and is continuing to go through an extremely stressful property situation (albeit in this country), I cannot stress enough how important it is to lawyer up and keep your head. Sometimes the law is an ass and an extremely frustrating one at that, and it sounds like Spanish squatters rights may fall in to that tbh. I would really carefully consider doing anything like changing the locks because that could backfire hugely. Good luck.

I have a place in Spain and this happens a lot. Friendly neighbours profiteering from absent owners. For that reason we don’t give anybody the keys. Sorry this has happened but I don’t have any specific advice.

THIS I'm afraid, a friend of mine took YEARS to remove squatters from his parent's holiday home in Spain, again it started as an informal arrangement set up by his sister, but the temporary guests decided to stay.

do i have this right the neighbor who's oversight and upkeep was initially helpful, was given permission to do short term lets with your father's property.
the problem is your father did not have much of this in writing.
equally once your father had begun to feel better then he should have given the neighbor fair warning.
i can see how a neighbor in this situation rather than go through the hassle of multiple short term lets would simply do one longer let.
how long since your father's stroke?

This.
My concern would be that the neighbour has done it because he knows how to get away with it.

Ugh. My parents ended up having to pay the electricity bill of the people renting their property in Spain. Its a minefield .

This is nuts. You need a Spanish property lawyer. They aren’t squatters as they think they have a tenancy. Is there some crime the neighbour has committed? Hopefully! I’d go as planned though, yell and suggest they move into neighbours house or he finds them new accomodation, as you plan to be a royal pain in the ass until it’s fixed. Can you sell a property while ‘tenanted’ there?

You say it's been rented out without permission, but also that your father gets the rent, minus commission for his neighbour. Which is it? If he's getting rent he's in an arrangement to let it out, and his neighbour is acting as his agent. Sort out exactly what's been going on before you do anything or you might be acting illegally.

Why are any of you surprised if your father has been receiving rent?

In theory you are within your rights to expect the tenants to vacate, but in practice you cannot expect an innocent family to be made homeless when they could have been living there for 4 years!

What a mess. Agree with need to get legal advice fast.

Nobody hear can help you, you need to urgently seek expert advice in Spain.

Does the neighbor have a wife/ partner? Or is his property empty too?

I think what has happened is that the neighbour has become used to us not using it and has been renting it out far more than we were aware.

If he has been renting it out and not paying you/your Dad the rent, that's fraud. If he has been paying, though, you should have a record of the payments. And you should also have a contract with the full names of the people living there, because the neighbour is in effect just your agent.

For example, the people who are going to be in the house until January arrived when? If they are not yet in the house then the lease can be cancelled. If they have been there since this January or earlier, then you should have been seeing some rent by now.

So either it's an open and shut case for the police, or you barely have a leg to stand on. But we are missing the level of detail we'd need to tell between the two.

This sounds dodgy. Your Dad has been receiving money but didn't know the property was rented out? This is one of the reasons I don't let out my French house. I just let family and friends borrow it on dates I don't want to use it. My adult DC are always telling me to rent it out and make some money on it but you never know who you might get renting it. If your Dad has received money and they have a long term rental contract until January there will be nothing you can do. It's not the renters fault. Your Dad should have known he wouldn't be getting so much rent from it being empty.

😨

And it wasn't even a thread - just a post that totally won a general (long) CF thread, along with a few responses to other people's open-mouthed questions!

You don't even know if he's telling the whole truth about tenants, or whether he's maybe been allowing a friend or family member to stay there long-term.

That would explain why your Dad hasn't been receiving any money that would have made it obvious what was going on, if he's been letting somebody close to him stay there free.

Or alternatively, maybe, if he's been 'forgetting' to tell your Dad about renting it out on an ongoing commercial basis, he may also have been 'forgetting' to pass any rent on as well.

Every post seems to start with "THIS" on this thread, except they're all different 🤔

What the neighbour has been apparently doing does sound shocking, but I can kind of see how one thing might have turned into another and he justified it to himself that he wasn't really doing anything much wrong.

He still should have been passing on the rent money (less his commission), though, if he hasn't been doing so.

How have the bills been managed and who has been paying them? Surely your Dad would have noticed a big increase in usage (and thus cost) when he's expecting to pay for an odd security light, heating on at 3 degrees to prevent pipes freezing in winter and maybe a freezer - and then there's suddenly ongoing full occupied house-level usage of all the utilities?

We have had squatters in our Spanish property for a year now. The police and courts are aware but despite a denuncio (type of warrant ) being issued they still live there and the local police don't give shit. Spain is a law unto itself.

If the neighbour doesn't get them out just move in to the neighbours house instead

That's what I'd do

I do have some experience of Spanish rentals. I would say speak to the neighbour to see who is renting it and what their situation is. From my experience, a lot of the longer term rents are actually people emigrating who are looking for something to buy etc. He may be able to ask them to move or give notice depending on the tenancy agreement. However, as pp have mentioned, tenants have a lot of rights in Spain and it is unlikely they will want to move in the summer when rents are sky high. People always try to get a rental place in the winter to run through the summer.
Do you have any other friends out in Spain who could try and help sort this out?
If you don’t get anywhere get legal advice and maybe someone will have to fly out to try and sort it out. Good luck!

Your dad receives money but didn't understand it was happening?

I mean tbh it sounds like the neighbour has been doing you a favour and you agreed to him renting it out and are now complaining he has rented it out… I feel a bit sorry for him

That's appalling; but things are hardly ideal in the UK either. Successive laws designed to protect vulnerable tenants from unfair treatment by nasty landlords are ripe for exploitation by tenants who deliberately swing the balance of power completely in their favour - often just because they know they can, and the landlord is helpless to do anything about it.

There was a thread on here a while back where OP and her family were living abroad for a year (iirc - quite a long time, at any rate), so they had agreed to rent their house to an acquaintance for a specified fixed period. Not only did the tenant just stop paying rent after the first month, but she then refused to leave at the end of the agreed period, knowing full well that the owner and family would then have nowhere to live themselves when back in the UK.

There were several apparent landlord-haters on the thread who seemed to be gleefully telling OP that she should quite cheerfully keep paying for her squatter's utilities and repairs/maintenance to keep it nice and pleasant and properly homely for her (I think there were still regular monthly mortgage payments due on the house too), whilst the whole family was then left having to try to sofa-surf at friends' homes for the foreseeable future.