The safe way to buy overseas

Knowing you want an overseas holiday home is the easy bit. Knowing where to start can be far trickier. Look at the internet and thousands of agents will vie for your attention. Read the papers and you may start to get cold feet at mention of ‘land grab’ or dubious estate agents. Then there’s the fact that you are here and the properties and agents are thousands of miles away over there.

Over 1 million British people have already acted on the dream of owning a home overseas and the same number again is predicted to do so in the next five years. But if you want to join them, how do you go about it?

With these questions in mind, Hanson has teamed up with Lighthouse to help those of our clients who are interested in overseas property. www.lighthouse-property.com has both resale and new development properties in the most popular countries, such as Spain, Portugal and Florida and is packed full of advice and information on buying property abroad.

Lighthouse - which is based in Bedfordshire and has English-speaking staff in its Spanish offices - works with a network of ethical estate agents. These agents abide by a strictly-enforced Code of Ethics to protect buyers from the problems associated with the largely unregulated overseas property market.

Your Hanson Wealth financial adviser will be able to help you with all the financial aspects of buying your holiday home such as overseas mortgages, tax advice, lifetime mortgages.

"Lighthouse provides a protected environment for the customer," says its Managing Director Shaun Powell. "I know from personal experience that buying a home abroad can be stressful when you're dealing with a different language, legal system, currency and culture, so we have removed the hassle and risks involved in buying abroad by making sure that customers deal only with our accredited network of estate agents.

"The ethos behind Lighthouse is trust," Powell adds. "We protect customers from potential pitfalls and give them the peace of mind by dealing only with trustworthy agents."

For more information, you may wish to contact an IFA (Independent Financial Adviser) who will be able to take you through the options available to you and help you find a deal to suit your needs. Hanson Wealth Management would be happy to talk you through your options, you can contact us on 0800 881 8085 or alternatively you can leave your details on the application form here.