I have heard that if purchasing a property in Spain it is advisable to set up a company and purchase your property through the company - this way it is possible to claim back the 7% VAT that is charged .
Has anyone got any experience of this ?
Is there much to it ? how much does it cost ? Any drawbacks etc ?
I intend contacting a solicitor but in the meantime any guidence or advice would be very welcome
I am not sure of this but in the case of non-spanish companies I think there is an additional annual tax payable based on the value of the property.
I would be interested to hear how you get on with this as it is something I will need to investigate myself in the near future. I have got some info on this that I have not got around to reading, I will try and do so and see is there any useful info in it.
I haven't heard of too many people setting up a company to buy property in Spain. Advice I was given years ago was that the annual charges relating to starting up/owning a company in Spain far outweigh any advantage in VAT refund.
As I said this info may be way out of date. I too would be interested in the results of your research.
Wasn't there an issue with this in Portugal ? A lot of British buyers bought using this method over the years but the Portuguese government moved to close down the loophole meaning people would be caught for a lot of back taxes ?