Investors flee to sun to escape banks' call

WE hear that an increasing number of property owners are brushing up on their Spanish because of the need to suddenly move there, should their old friend the bank manager suddenly call in all the loans.

Property owners who have been declining invitations to make their first visits to various bank headquarters to discuss their position are increasingly looking for an out.

Who can blame them when it looks as if the bank is giving a wide berth to the big developers who owe a vast fortune. Instead they are picking on smaller investors who were relying on their interest-only arrangement to keep the show in the road.

The sad reality is that most of these simply cannot afford big increases in repayments with rents lower now than in previous years and the market oversupplied in many areas.

Of couse this is something the buyer and banker should have foreseen in the heat of the boom years, but no amount of stress testing would have prepared them for what has happened in the financial markets.

Several well-known investors have moved to Spain and to Portugal in recent weeks to put themselves beyond the reach of the banks and they’ve been followed by others in property-related businesses.

Once overseas, it’s hard for the banks to keep track of them, or slap down a summons.

Meanwhile the banks plow on at home, hoping to persuade customers still residing here to cough up as much as they can in an effort to keep themselves solvent.

Tough times ahead.