Hi all, I?m new to this forum so I will start by introducing myself, my name is Alistair and I?ve been in Spain for around 18 months now.

I?m in a little pickle as I dont know where I stand with this!

I have been renting an appartment now since the end of January, I payed 3 months up front to move into the appartment, 2 months deposit and 1 months rent. The rent since then has been payed late a couple of times but has always been payed! This time it was also late nearly 2 weeks unfortunatley. My landlord has sent an email to her solicitor requesting for them to notify us that she wishes me to leave the appartment.

Do I have a leg to stand on as the rent is actually payed?

Any help much appreciated!

Thank you

what sort of rental agreement do you have and for how long?
why is the lanlord wanting you to leave - because of late payment or for some other reason?
In theory, you have never been late as a request for two months deposit is illegal in Spain (of course, if you had said this to the landlord before signing then he would prob not have let you have the place) so you could say you paid two month’s rent in advance. now you are in you could demand the extra month back.

I have an 11 month contract, which started from the 28th Jan 2009.

All the landlady wants me to leave for is late payment!

Thats very interesting about it being illegal to take 2 months rent as a deposit, you dont have a clippit of that do you from somewhere so that I can keep this in my arsenal should she get funny again?

Thanks for the speedy reply

11 month is fairly standard. there should be a clause re either side ending the agreement giving x months notice. this is fair enough and if it is there then it can be ended early…for whatever reason.

look here:

http://www.spainexpat.com/spain/forum/viewthread/5758/

for other similar posts re deposits.

Also see here for some legal stuff…including deposit:

http://www.spainlawyer.com/guialegal/guialegal.cfm?IDCAPITULO=04060000#04040200000000

Oh brilliant, thanks a lot for that!

I do have an acknowledgment for the 2 months deposit and the first months rent but I dont believe there is anywhere which states that either the landlord or tenant can end the agreement given x months notice!

As my contract runs out on one of the worse possible days 28th December we are going to start looking for somewhere now as over the xmas period it will be a nightmare!!

Would I be well within my rights to ask for at least 1 month back then so that I could look and place this on another apartment? And then to get the other part of the deposit back at the end of the contract when she has inspected and found nothing wrong with the apartment?

I believe so. To the best of my knowledge the repayment of the additional 1 month deposit is enforceable by law although you may have to go to court to force the landlord to pay up.

You may find this helpful, it`s from the Menetos, the Independant Research group for the private financial sectors of the European community.

It explains rental agreements in Spain, contract rules and regs.

http://www.monetos.co.uk/service/rental-guide/es/

From what i gather there is no standard contract, the rent and deposit and other terms are negiotiated between the two parties.

A landlord can charge 20 months worth of deposit if he wishes too.

I copied this from the site.

Security deposit .

The tenant is legally required to pay the landlord at least one month’s rent as a security deposit, before they move into the property. This money acts as insurance for the landlord: in the case of damage to the property or breach of contract, the landlord is entitled to keep this deposit as compensation. If there are no problems during the rental term, the landlord must return this security deposit to the tenant when they move out. After five years, the value of this security deposit can be increased in line with the Consumer Price Index (CPI) (and the tenant must pay the difference), to counteract the effects of inflation.

Opinion does seem to differ although it should be said that the law of rentals in Spain comes second to the terms negotiated by the parties (except where they are unfair e.g. excessive deposits). I have heard of cases where deposits of over 1 month have had to be returned. The Monetos site is a general overview of the law and is not necessarily complete - “The rental term may be any length up to five years. When the agreed term is shorter, the tenant can extend the contract to last five years if they wish to do so.” This is not true if the original contract is for less than one year.