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COSTA BLANCA NORTE / VALENCIA FREE Vol. 4 Issue 94 www.theolivepress.es November 17th - November 30th 2022
GIVE IT BACK! Brits taking on Santander Bank 13 YEARS after their dream house was ‘illegally’ repossessed
Twist in Levi hunt By Anthony Piovesan
AN X-Factor star who went missing in strange circumstances in Spain three weeks ago may have been spotted. Rugby player Levi Davis’ mother told the Olive Press he may have been seen as recently as Monday, this week, in Barcelona. Julie Davis revealed she received information from an alleged eye witness that her son, 24, had ‘been sighted’ at Placa de Sant Agusti looking ‘lost and confused’. The woman claimed she had also seen Levi the previous weekend in the same area. The square is just off Barcelona’s La Rambla, where he was last officially photographed leaving The Old Irish Pub, at 10pm, on October 29. The information has now been passed on to officers investigating the high-profile case.
EXCLUSIVE By Alex Trelinski
A BRITISH couple are going to court over the 2009 repossession of their dream home in Spain. Tina and Steve Poole are fighting Santander Bank for being turfed out after they could not keep pace with their mortgage repayments. Their lawyer says the repossession should be scrapped as clauses to validate it in the mortgage contract were illegal. The 240-year-old farmhouse in Manises-Ribarroja was repossessed in 2009, but has been lived in by squatters ever since, resulting in a lot of damage. The Pooles have now launched legal action against Santander (formerly Banco Popular) to get their four-bedroom house back. They are also claiming rent from the time they were evicted. And if successful, it would be an ‘al-
HAPPIER TIMES: The Pooles before losing Valencia home
most unique’ victory in reversing a bank seizure - especially after so many years. The Pooles, who are currently based in Morocco where Steve is an engineer, say their case has been strengthened by special courts set up in Spain over recent years to specifically deal with 'bank disputes’ like theirs. The couple had first moved to Spain in 2000 with their three
children, firstly living in Javea, before moving to the large rural ‘masia’ in inland Valencia. “We spent a lot of money renovating it and yes, we did get behind with the mortgage, which we believe we were unfairly treated over,” Tina told the Olive Press. “The bank simply refused to discuss the debt, especially as we were charged an interest rate of 8%, while they were advertising 2.5% rates at the time,” she continued.
Suitcase
Debts
It has become a real mystery as Levi, who played for Bath, vanished after taking an unscheduled boat trip to Barcelona from a holiday with a pal in Ibiza. He had flown to Ibiza to spend time with expat Richard Squire, who lives on the party island. Marketing boss Squire revealed he had traveled to the Catalan capital to ‘visit someone, but he didn’t tell me who’. He added he had left his suitcase in Ibiza. In 2020, Levi made history when he Continues on Page 4
CHARMING: Pooles raised three kids in the four-bed villa
“They lent us enough to pay the original mortgage for a year, but that landed us with two debts, and a subsequent repossession which we’ve been told was illegally executed.” So bad was the situation, they were forced to return to the UK and their children had to leave their schools after nine happy years in Spain. Ever since then, the couple have worked continually on a legal challenge which will be heard in Santander’s High Court, in Can-
tabria, next February, after an initial hearing was adjourned in September. One major concern has been Santander Bank trying to sell off the house, while legal proceedings are active. “Our lawyer had to rush to Santander this year to get an injunction after I found out the property had been reserved for a potential buyer,” explained Tina. Since then any agents marketing the property, must explain clearly online and in print that it is ‘under litigation’. While the couple are convinced they will win their case next year, they expect the case to go to the European Courts, as Santander ‘will probably appeal’.
Squatters
“We will certainly also have to take more action to force them to pay for the damage made by the squatters,” Tina added. Santander has been approached for comment, but we had received no reply as we went to press.
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