5th Mar CASTELO BRANCO

What a day we’ve had ......................................... we went to the estate agent first thing and said we wanted to see inside Quinta Donkey and view another couple of properties. They agreed we could do this after lunch, so we spent the morning chilling (shopping and reading our kindles).

First off we saw one of the properties we had been looking at on the internet; it has less land than we want (6 acres) but it’s walled, has electricity and a house that is liveable in and all this for only 41.250€. It was nice, the house was much bigger than any of the other houses we’ve seen (except the 27 acre one), the land had olive and fruit trees, vines and vegetable garden; all in all it had a lot of potential but ............... we really, really like the land at Quinta Donkey!

So then we had our second viewing of Quinta Donkey; first we looked in the shed complex – they were big, high and solidly built (the roof needs renewing, but the tiles can be reused) they could be converted into quite a good size house. The house, again, was solid, two good size areas which could be used as a studio (for me) and a gym (for Brett). And the land is still wonderful! However ........

Yesterday we had an message from my sister’s in laws (they live in the Algarve) and they have kindly offered to share their knowledge of buying in Portugal; they also emphasised to be very careful when buying. We are so tempted by Quinta Donkey; before we left Britain we bought a book “Buying a property in Portugal” which explains the pitfalls of buying in Portugal, it tells you all the things you should check before you put in an offer and lists all the documents you need to check (all the boring legal stuff) and here we are ignoring everything we’ve read (our hearts are trying to rule our heads) their message arrived just in time!!!  We have decided to travel down to the Algarve to visit them this week, and at the same time have a bit of a beach holiday. Who knows we might find something nearer the sea? (and then we could have a boat).

Here is the link to Quinta Donkey; the pictures don’t do it justice – it wasn’t one of the ones we chose to look, at the estate agents suggested it when we told them what we are looking for.