Husband wants to move to Fuerteventura.

[Pepperpot69]

My DH is always 110% sensible. Head screwed on, good business brain, thinks things threw etc etc. We have just returned from a fabulous 10 day holiday and suddenly he wants to sell everything and move there! He is writing business plans, making appts with lawyers and banks, learning Spanish and getting me to research schools!
A month ago I barely knew where the island was and now we seem to be moving there!
I am not wholly against the idea just 95%! It seems too much to take in. Any advice very gratefully received!

Will you or he be able to work there? Do you speak Spanish? Are you basing this idea on just one ten day holiday? Actually, you can scratch the last one, I emigrated to a country I'd never even visited. . Its not an impossible idea but you really have to be practical and take everything into account. The economy in Spain isn't great at the minute so I'd be making sure you will have a bullet proof sustainable income of some sort. Also emigrating can be a lonely and difficult business when you are starting out even without a language barrier, so if you are going to do this you need to learn Spanish asap.

Have you got a source of income for the new location?

I think Glasto has a very valid point on are you basing it on a holiday. I too moved with out seeing the country, but would think a holiday would give you the wrong ideas about living in a place. You don't see rush hour, don't spend all day trailing round every supermarket to find Marmite, understand the nuances of a different school system..... Can you tell what I've been doing this week????

Writing business plans. So self employed? How are you going to be able to predict income with out a true knowledge of the economy? Have you seen the place out of peak tourist season?

Warm all year round soon looses its appeal (maybe it just gets too warm here). You can tell the Northern Europeans: on the occasions its rains, we have kids in wellies, wear sensible shoes and get on with it. Locals seem to freeze and not know how to deal with it, and many others try to continue in their fancy sandals, and wonder why their feet feal gritty (sandy place).

His plan is to sell the properties we have here and buy 2 holiday let properties and we would rent for 18months to get to know the locations etc before buying for ourselves. We already own holiday lets so know the 'business' and how it works so income should be ok and of course whilst economy not great, living costs are considerably lower. Spanish tutor booked to start with us next week!
Yes Glasto I am worried about being lonely, I completely agree with you.
Desert I can fully believe the novelty of 'warm all year round' soon wears off! I will miss green fields, woods and wildlife definitely, I'm a real country girl and not sure if this lifestyle is for me at all but I don't know how to put the brakes on this crazy idea, he has an answer for everything and is doing what he thinks is best!

Leratning the language enough to read leagal papers may be

Do you have school age children? They would have to go to school on Lanzarote (by Ferry). That's what stopped us going there.

Plenty of 'green' - but mostly golf courses!

I would move for a trial period 6months - 1yr, but I wouldn't sell any UK properties till after the trial period and even then I think I would keep some UK assets.

Spain's economy and housing market is not stable.

is doing what he thinks is best

Best for him

You barely register as a person if your whole life can be torn apart against your will because of some man's holiday plans.

I presume he's not planning to inflict this move on any children?

Or do you all have to just do what he wants when he wants it?

From a tourist's point of view, I would never be arsed arranging separate flights and holiday let in FV because package deals are so good. Would the business be sustainable?

It sounds like he is railroading you. Has he even asked if you want to move?

I thought holiday lets were still illegal in the canaries?

We did something vaguely similar 13 years ago in that we sold up in the uk and moved to the Algarve - but - we had been coming here several times a year for 15 years, already had bought a holiday apartment which we still let out, already had a bank account, knew people etc

We're still here, but it isn't all sunshine and sangria and we've seen so many people who haven't been able to make it work and have gone back, sometimes losing fortunes in the process.

How do you make a small fortune in the Algarve? Start with a big one

And we don't have any kids!

It all seems a bit sudden. Couldn't you sell one of the properties and put your toe in the water re holiday lets over there and stay here for now, popping over a few times a year to get to know the place? I think it hinges on whether you have kids or if you have a job you'd be reluctant to give up.

Don't you get a say in this?

Can't comment on schools there but I know quite a few people who have moved to mainland Spain but moved home once their children hit secondary age.
No idea what the issue is specifically just that provision isn't " good"

Depends if you have or are planning children I suppose

there used to be reality shows about people like this - drop everything and leave in 2 weeks. It ALWAYS ended in disaster.

so you've got kids and it appears that the island has no British schools. How much Spanish do your kids speak?

We moved to Spain when DS was 10 and he thrived. He is now a post grad at Oxford so the local Spanish school did him proud. He was fluent in Spanish very quickly thanks to not going to a British school, but it doesn't work for everyone. The older your kids are the harder they will find learning the language and leaving their friends.
We lived on the mainland and although I loved the Canaries I knew I couldn't live on a small island and be that restricted despite having dozens of great holidays there.

As costa said it's easy to make bad decisions or even good ones and still loose money. We made the mistake of selling our uk home when we went. Fortunately despite loosing money on property in Spain we were able to just about jump back in to the uk market when we returned. Don't be railroaded into this, if it's going to work you both have to want it as if it all goes belly up the liklihood is so will your relationship.