One effect of the weakened exchange rate (recently dropped from 1.53 to 1.22) has been a significant reduction for Expat’s pensions:

Couples who receive the basic state pension of £628 a month saw its value when converted into euros fall from €961 in January 2007 to €766 last month, according to HIFX, the currency exchange specialists.

UK motorists travelling in Europe will find the cheapest fuel in Spain and Switzerland, according to a survey.

Switzerland was the only one of 12 European destinations where unleaded fuel cost less than £1 a litre while driving in Spain was the best value for diesel and hire car drivers.

Not surprisingly the UK didn’t do so well …..

Record numbers of Britons are leaving UK, but the number of Britons relocating to UK is also increasing every year – last year more than 80,000 expats came home.

We have written before about making it work in Almerimar, adapting to life in Spain and advice on people that are returning back to the UK, so it was with interest that I read in the Telegraph that ITV1 is making the second series of ‘No Place Like Home?’ which aims to give British expats an opportunity to fact-find, and equip themselves to make an informed choice - to remain an expat or realise it’s time to come back home.

I was really interested to read an article yesterday, which was actually a follow-up to a forum debate, and is about a subject on my mind at the moment, particularly as another friend has decided to return to live in the UK.

This was an important subject of debate in the forum last week. The general consensus was that although it is easy to set up a new life in Spain when you are young, free and single, it is an extremely risky proposition if you are married, mortgaged, and have kids.Notes From Spain

Just learned that another couple that we have known for a while are returning to the UK to live. This triggered something in my mind that I had read a while ago about the potential pitfalls of returning to the UK and the things you can do to plan ahead if you do decide to go back to live in the UK after a period of living abroad.

Maybe not so gloomy after all for Brits looking to secure a holiday or eventual retirement home in Spain, as Spain has cut the Capital Gains Tax Rate:

The decision is good news for those looking to move into a property market suffering from negative publicity

This tax is payable on any profits made when you sell a second property, either in the UK or abroad. Yet while it shrinks the sum you walk away with, the rate levied in Spain - where 800,000 Britons have chosen to buy homes - has fallen.

The Spanish Costas were the start of the love-affair with property abroad for British people, and despite economy gloom, and stiff competition from new emerging markets, such as Turkey and Bulgaria, it appears we are still rather fond of them as a ‘tried and tested destination’.

The full article below looks at the Costas in turn, and compares features and property prices. I have focussed on the our own Costa Almeria in this article:

Gibralter has long been a bone of contention between Britain and Spain, with Spain calling for its return; the latest move towards joint sovereignty in 2002 was rejected in a referendum by 99% of Gibraltarians.

Now Spain is calling for the British colony to be blacklisted as a tax haven, claiming that it shelters corrupt businesses, among its 28,000 registered companies.

i was reading an article today that pointed out that very few Britains are taking full advantage of our Isa allowances, and even those that are could be making more money if they watched the market and switched between providers more often to maximise their interest rates. Expats don’t have access to new Isa accounts but could manage any existing ones better:

Ok so living here in Almerimar we all miss things about the UK, and for women a lot of that is shopping. Most of my clothes, cosmetic, books etc. still come from the Uk and US but I am lucky in that I have family willing to send on my Internet orders to Spain, and between us Chris and I go back to the UK a few times a year to pick up other stuff up.

There appears to be growing concern in the UK that, from recent figures, only about 1% of the elegible expat electorate are actually voting. Some of this is due to lack of knowledge (in some cases that they are even allowed to vote), but a lot is due to apathy and the perceived difficulty with actually registering.
For me this is simple, as I now share my parents-in-laws’ UK address, and, as they have been efficiently sorting their postal votes for years (living 6 months of the year in Florida), I have been added to their forms. But if I had to get around to doing it all myself, I wonder if I would actually bother.

This is the start of a number of articles I hope to write for parents and prospective parents, hopefully from the experience of other expats who have already ‘been there’. At this stage it is not too detailed as it based on what I, as a non-parent, have found out to date, so any additions would be gratefully received by myself and other parents. Please comment if you have useful information.

I actually like visiting America. The summer we switched our base from the UK to here in Almerimar, Chris got a new contract which meant that we were spending half our time over in the US in 6 week blocks. Although I did get tired of all the travelling, the US, in all its commercialism, was a perfect contrast to our time spent here. I love the big gyms, movie houses and of course the opportunities to shop! So much of the stuff I like to buy from cosmetics to running shoes is cheaper over there and even more so now that the dollar is so weak.

Further to my last post on healthcare entitlement, I thought I’d clarify how a retired expat who has taken out residency in Spain goes about registering for state healthcare.

The process, from a friend’s recent experience, appears to be efficient and pretty straightforward:

Firstly you need to contact the NHS in Newscastle to let them know you are now resident in Spain, and to get a form E121. The only telephone number I could find online was: 0845 605 0707, which is the helpline for the European Health Insurance Card, but that’s a start.

I read today that British expats in France have won a six-month fight to have the new rules regarding their entitlement to heathcare changed, and thought it was useful to compare the new situation in France, with the entitlement here in Spain.

“The French government has backed down on a policy that had stripped thousands of Britons living in France of their right to benefit from the French state health insurance system.”

This is for anyone looking for a ‘low risk’ property investment opportunity, without the need to have a large deposit. All sounds a bit too good to be true but it is certainly worth further investigation. The article I read was focused on expats living in France, the reason being obvious as you read on, but I can’t see any reason why expats in Spain (or anywhere) couldn’t take advantage of this as long as you are ok with a property viewing trip to France!

Well it’s January 22nd so Burns night (25th) is almost upon us. Last week we posted about the planned Burns night supper at El Espigon. Since then Chris put a comment on that post giving more details, but for those of you who may not have seen it and are interested in going, please see below, AND if anyone wants to see again the snazzy poster then click here: Poster

For me the reported turmoil in the Spanish property market is just an interesting news story, as I have no immediate plans to buy more property here and am happy with the home I have. But to the many back in the UK it must be a major factor in putting them off making that move to Spain, or even investing in a much wanted holiday property here. Noone wants to lose money, and recent news from around the world has highlighted that investing in property is definitely not without risk.

It seems as if the situation regarding expat homes that have been illegally built is starting to get very nasty: “Hundreds of Britons fear that they could lose their homes on the Costas in what they claim is an “out-and-out persecution” of the expatriate community.”

An article I read today follows on from my previous post: ‘Dream Home Demolished’. Another English couple fear that their bungalow just outside Vera here on the Costa Almeria is about to be demolished. Next weekend they will be among thousands demonstrating outside their local town hall.

In this article Jacqui shares with us some of her food fetishes. Well OK she doesn’t got that far but she does give some food for thought ……

Having moved over here some time ago we have settled in to more of a Spanish diet rather than an English one. However, there are some English foods we still enjoy so here is our brief guide to what we buy where in and around Almerimar.