About Nick Snelling
Author – Journalist – Realtor
I am a journalist and author of six books (three of which are about Spain). I live permanently in Spain with my family and, whilst not writing, I run Casalasafor Consultancies, a real estate agency for properties located around Gandia in Spain.
Of the six books that I have written, four have been factual. These have included ‘How to Buy Spanish Property and Move to Spain – Safely!’ and ‘The Laptop Entrepreneur.’ I have also written the text to several books by one of the world’s top documentary photographers (Jurgen Schadeberg).
I have undertaken investigative journalism on a wide range of matters concerning Spain. This has included tackling subjects as diverse as corruption, the economy, divorce and domestic violence, drugs, the Spanish property crash, immigration, the Spanish culture of brothel use and even a profile of a high-class call-girl!
I have been a columnist for the A Place in the Sun magazine and I have featured as an expert on programmess by the BBC (Radio 4 and BBC 1), ITV and Channel 4 (A Place in the Sun). I have also appeared on numerous programmes for House Hunters International (US TV) – with regard to matters concerning Spain and Spanish property. This has complemented the time I have spent co-presenting a TV program for a Spanish TV channel, voice-over work for documentaries and ‘fixing’ that I have undertaken for a major TV production company.
I am also involved in international humanitarian missions, which has included working within Afghanistan, Ukraine and Jordan/Gaza.
Marbella, the Godfather, a face lift and Mr Clean BY NICK SNELLING For property owners in Marbella the corruption and malfeasance of Marbella Town hall has been a nightmare of truly appalling proportions with an emotional cost difficult to calculate. Some 600-700 properties risk being demolished whilst around 18,000 others are blighted by illegality. Amazingly, one of the potentially richest towns in Spain is virtually bankrupt and has an infrastructure on the point of collapse. The scandal of Marbella is a story that verges on the incredible. To some extent, it all began with the property crash of 1989. Marbella was already notorious as a place where the jet-set rubbed shoulders with criminals and shady businessman. For twenty years its…
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Clubbing Together, Brothels in Spain and Spanish Culture BY NICK SNELLING In 2003, Spain’s Institute of National Statistics (INE) showed that just over one in four Spanish men under the age of 49 had experienced sex with a prostitute – with one in fifteen having done so within the previous year. This was backed up by Maribel Montano of the ruling PSOE party who claimed in 2007 that: ‘every day 1.5 million men pay for sex’ in Spain. In fact, there are an estimated 300,000 prostitutes working in Spain possibly turning over around 40 billion Euros per year, which roughly equates to the country’s education budget. For good reason, Spain is sometimes dubbed the ‘Brothel of Europe’. Certainly, the openness…
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AWAITING THE TEMPEST (Spain from dictatorship to democracy) Part 5 The aftermath… On the 20th November 1975 General Franco died in La Paz hospital, Madrid. He was 82 and had long outlived Hitler, Mussolini and Stalin, his contemporary dictators. He had also managed to die in bed surrounded by physicians, after a long life, something that he had so cruelly denied many Spaniards during his 36 years of power. Right to the end of his life, Franco remained in charge. However, to some extent, his power had been diminished by the death of the one man who may have ensured the continuance of his regime. This was Admiral Carrero Blanco, a hard line Francoist and member of the Opus Dei,…
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AWAITING THE TEMPEST (Spain from dictatorship to democracy) Part 4 Imagine it is the early 1970s and you are in Spain… Fiestas may not be emblematic of Spain but they do spring to some people’s minds when the country is mentioned. They occur annually everywhere in Spain, in every town and village, last several days and take a bewildering multitude of forms, some of which are very bizarre. However, most have a religious basis, and many can be profoundly moving. Interestingly, fiestas are not some artifice created by Franco or his tourist department. Most fiestas date back into the mists of time and are usually highly ritualised events that celebrate the Catholic faith. A fine example is the Easter (Semana…
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