"During the summer of 2000 my wife and I decided that having owned several hostels on the island of Mallorca during our 40 years living there, it was time, at 75 years of age, to pursue our passion on the mainland.

Our close friends were already surfing the web and were directly in contact with Interealty and in pursuit of their own hostel, so we knew about the wide range of commercial properties on the Interealty books. We ourselves were soon speaking with Brian at the Interealty Commercial Division. We explained our intention to buy a commercial property on the Costa del Sol and he quickly helped us on our first step of the venture by faxing through to us reams of listings for hotels, hostels, guest houses and B & B villas along the Costa and in the countryside, businesses which fell within our search criteria.

After making our selection and being greeted at Malaga Airport by the staff at the Interealty hospitality stand in the baggage hall, we were greeted a few steps further along in the arrivals hall by Brian and driven to the hotel that Brian had pre-booked for our Inspection Visit, which was conveniently opposite one of the hostels we were interested in viewing. Next morning off we went viewing and during the following days were shown a dozen or so properties all around the Costa and inland. In the end, top of our short list was the hostel opposite our hotel. An appointment was made with the owner and a viewing set up for that day.

Despite the obvious need for a face lift and some more serious renovation work, Brian, through the good offices of Interealty, managed to negotiate a fair price for us well under the owners original asking price. We secured our intention to buy with a reasonable deposit and went back to Mallorca to pack up home and ship ourselves and our possessions to the Costa del Sol. In the meantime Interealty organised the redecoration of the 11 th floor apartment we had chosen as our new home, just up the road from the hostel. During this period of preparation Brian went ahead with all the legal aspects of the purchase and referred us to a leading Marbella firm of lawyers retained by Interealty who would do all the searches and drafting of fresh contracts on our behalf. This proved to be a very wise decision. It transpired that certain aspects of the existing contracts were not in order and some of the information offered by the seller was not quite as appeared at first sight. However, by January of 2001 we were the new owners of what is proving to be, for us at 75, a very pleasant and rewarding experience."