Water Damages

When I first came to Tenerife 16 years ago, it did not rain in the South of the Island. Full stop. I am sure it rained the odd day. My memories of the old Tenerife are clear. A barren, dry south and a cooler lush north.

We stayed twice in a lovely family-run hotel in Los Cristianos called Paradise Park. The reception did not have a roof. It did rain one day and the astonished and dismayed staff ran around looking for towels.

I may exaggerate, but not a lot. One way or another it looks as if rain is here to stay. The architects of Adeje Paradise may not have had rain in mind when they designed the exoctic roofs of our lovely complex.

David Hernandez has asked for people who have had rain problems to give him their names - at last count some 43 units reported problems - there may be even more.

The intention is to get a common platform to approach Solterra about our problems. From this morning's meeting I can see a number of problems arising

1. There may be costs invoilved for either individuals or the community that people had not considered - legal fees, architects fees etc. David mentioned a figure this morning's meeting of perhaps 250 euro each - yes each! ( I think,) (I may have the figure wrong) per person.

2. There are rumours to the effect that 'Solterra' may be shortly forced into Administration so we run the risk of throwing good money after bad.

3. People may share my appraoch that Solterra may not be the best people to solve the problems and many - like me - have just solved the problems ourselves without recourse to Solterra or to insurance - rightly or wrongly.

4. Some of our residents may come up with far better solutions than the builder. A lot of problems may be solved by partly sealing the air vents that seem to be causing a lot of the water problems. A simple solution has been found by attaching a see-through plastic covering to air vents that is cheap and effective.

5. I believe we cannot 'socialise' the problems. In a word everyone has to find their own solution to their own unit. We can work together - but we bought the apartments not as a community but as individuals and we have to solve the problems ourselves - other than clearly common problems such as roads, gardens or pools. Our own apparment is our own problem, shared with one other owner at most.

6. Otherwise we create an impossible situation. Some people will solve their problems simply and cheaply , others will wish to spend thousands, which is their own decison, but as a community we cannot stand behind personal decisons. Like the Irish Government we could end up trying to underwrite the impossible.

7. Others may have different views. But I cannot imagine a situation in Ireland where a group of people who bought houses individually in the same estate would agree to underwrite each others claims against a potentially inslovent builder.

It's just a view.

But it's an important view.

Because it's mine

Paz y luz

P