New-build warranty in Spain: what is covered, and for how long
Who this is for: For buyers of a new or recently built home in Spain, and of a villa its owner built for himself. The rules are the same everywhere in Spain and for every buyer.
The building is finished, the keys are yours, and the bank guarantee on your stage payments has closed. Two years later a damp patch appears on the bedroom wall. Or, seven years on, a crack runs down a load-bearing wall.
Who is responsible, and for how long? In Spain the answer is written into law, and it is fairly generous to the buyer.
In short
Spanish law gives three periods of liability after handover: one year for finishing defects, three years for defects that make the home less habitable (insulation, damp, services), ten years for the structure. They run from the date the works were accepted, not from the date you bought. You claim from the developer, who is jointly liable with everyone else involved in the build, and you have two years from when the damage appears. Only the ten-year structural insurance is compulsory. If you buy a villa its owner built for himself less than ten years ago, he must take out that insurance for the remaining years before selling.
Three periods: one, three and ten years
The Building Act (Ley 38/1999 de Ordenación de la Edificación) sorts defects into three categories, each with its own period.
Ten years: the structure. Foundations, pillars, beams, floor slabs, load-bearing walls and other structural elements. Everything that holds the building up. The longest period, because these defects are the most expensive and the most dangerous.
Three years: habitability. Thermal and sound insulation, hygiene and building services. In other words leaks, cold, damp, and problems with water and electrics. The legal term is a failure to meet the habitability requirements.
One year: finishes. Defects in the work you can see: surfaces, plaster, tiles, paint. For this year the builder answers directly.
When the clock starts
Not on the day you buy the flat, but on the date the works were accepted, when the building was taken over without reservations. If there were reservations at acceptance, the clock starts when they were put right.
In practice: if you buy a flat in a building handed over three years ago, your ten-year cover is not ten years but the remaining seven. The warranty belongs to the building, not to your purchase.
Who is liable, and why that helps you
Many parties take part in a build: the developer, the contractor, the architect, the site director, the technical director. Working out whose mistake caused a crack is a job for experts and the courts.
The good news: you do not have to.
The law makes the developer jointly liable with everyone else involved in the build towards buyers for material damage from defects. Jointly liable means you claim from the developer, and the developer cannot send you off to find the contractor at fault. They settle that among themselves afterwards.
For a buyer that matters: one clear address instead of five.
How long you have to claim
Two years from the moment the damage appears.
Do not confuse the two periods. Ten years is the window in which a defect counts. Two years is the time you have to make your claim once it has shown itself.
Example: a crack in a load-bearing wall appears in the eighth year after acceptance. It falls within the ten-year window, so it is covered. But you must claim within two years of it appearing, not wait until the ten years are up.
So the rule is simple: if you notice something, record it and claim straight away.
Insurance: only the ten-year policy is compulsory
Even some Spanish websites get this wrong.
The law describes three insurance policies, one for each period. But for residential buildings only one has been made compulsory: the ten-year policy, the seguro decenal, covering structural defects up to 100% of the construction cost.
The one-year policy (5% of the cost) and the three-year policy (30%) are in the law, but making them compulsory has been deferred: the law says the government may do so by separate regulation. That has not happened.
What it means in practice: for the structure, there is an insurer behind the developer, so the money is there even if the developer has since disappeared. For finishes and habitability there may be no insurance, and the claim goes to the developer directly. The developer is liable either way; the question is whether there is anyone left to pay.
Hence a practical point: the bigger and longer-established the developer, the more comfortable you can be about three-year defects.
A special case: a house the owner built for himself
There is an exception to the ten-year insurance. A private individual who builds a single house to live in himself does not have to take it out.
But: if he sells that house, he must take out the insurance for the rest of the ten-year period.
This matters directly to anyone buying a detached villa on the Costa Blanca. If you are buying a villa its owner built himself, and fewer than ten years have passed since it was built, ask about the ten-year insurance. The seller is obliged to provide it. If he has not, you have no insurance cover for the structure, and if a serious defect appears there may be nobody to claim from.
What to do if you find a defect
Record it. Dated photos, and video if it is a leak. The sooner the better: later you may have to prove when the defect appeared.
Notify in writing. Not by phone or a messaging app. You need a letter whose delivery and content can be proven. In Spain the usual way is a burofax, a registered letter with certified content.
If the defect affects the whole building, such as cracks in the façade, leaks in the underground car park or a problem with the roof, the owners' community makes the claim, not each owner separately. Raise it at the community meeting.
Bring in a professional. A technical report from an architect or engineer makes the conversation much easier. Without one, the dispute becomes your word against theirs.
What the warranty does not cover
To keep expectations realistic.
Normal wear is not a defect. After ten years terrace tiles look older than new ones, and nobody will pay for that.
Damage from misuse is not covered either: if a leak happens because an occupant altered the plumbing, the warranty does not apply.
And the most common one: the warranty covers material damage to the building, not a tile colour you dislike or a layout that feels smaller than it looked on the plan. Those are matters for the handover, to be settled before you sign, not two years later.
What to check at handover
Handover is the moment from which every period runs. Take it seriously.
Walk through every room with a torch. Open and close every window and door. Run every tap, check the pressure and the drainage. Test the electrics: sockets, lights, the fuse board. Look at corners, joints and around windows, where damp shows first. Check that everything promised in the contract is there: appliances, bathroom fittings, finishes.
Put everything you find in the handover record as reservations. That is not nit-picking: it is how you record a problem before the clock starts.
How your money is protected before handover, and the whole new-build purchase step by step, is in buying a new build in Spain.