You already have your main residence, but you would like to have a second home to enjoy your holidays or to spend some time of the year in a different location.
If you are hesitating between buying or renting a second home, in this post we tell you the advantages and disadvantages of these alternatives.
Advantages of renting a second home
There are many different formulas in the market that offer the opportunity to rent a second home for your holidays or for working remotely. For example, platforms like Airbnb, renting a holiday apartment for long periods of time, or even exchanging homes with other owners in different locations.
You can also find places where you can sign up for “fake co-ownership” (we call it like this because they don’t offer real ownership of the property rather they offer rent of it). We have spoken about it in the article that explained the differences between the right of use and a real co-ownership.
The main advantage of renting a second home is its flexibility: you can change destination any time you want and you don’t have to incur in maintenance costs or taxes related to the property.
Disadvantages of renting a second home
Despite all the advantages that have been mentioned above, there are some downsides when it comes to renting a second home.
In the first place, you don’t always have control over the state of the property that you are renting. The Internet is full of misleading information with edited photos or hidden expenses, and you could end up in a badly taken care of property, dirty or with broken appliances.
In the case of right of use formulas, there is also the added inconvenience of not being able to choose exactly which dates you want, rather you have to adapt to the aparthotel requirements.
Advantages of buying a second home
Logically, the main advantage of buying a second home is that you are making a property investment. In case your personal preferences change, or so do the market conditions, you can always sell and have the cash in hand to invest in a different property if wanted.
Furthermore, when considering that it is your own property, you will always know in which conditions you will find it, what costs are associated with owning it (both in maintenance as well as in tax related expenses).
Surely, buying a second home is the perfect option if you have a favourite location for your holidays and if you like to go back to the same place every year. You don’t have to plan different accommodation options every year because you know you have a house, you know the location, what is around, what plans are there to do, etc
On top of that, in the case of co-owning with secondPROP, you will not have to worry about anything. Book the dates that you want through the app and you will arrive at a perfectly clean house ready for you.
There will be no surprise extra costs, because all maintenance costs are 100% transparent and you will always know how much money is being spent in taxes, repairs, etc
Disadvantages of buying a second home
The main disadvantage of buying a second home is the necessity of making a big upfront investment to acquire your share of the property.
To that inconvenience, there is also something to add: the difficulty of all legal formalities and procedures that need to be followed even more difficult if you are not a Spanish citizen.
To make your life a little bit easier, in secondPROP we break down all expenses in a transparent way. In our properties catalogue you have access to all information regarding costs to acquire your share in any of our properties.
Your share includes all necessary procedures so you don’t have to worry about anything: we look for the rest of the owners, we create de SL (LTD), we manage your residency card, taxes, etc
And, surely, we take care of cleaning, maintaining the house in perfect shape, and all management related procedures throughout the year, so your only concern is to make sure you enjoy your second home.
