Shopping

Earlier I described the relative costs for everyday food shopping but what about the other items you might need to buy on the Costa del Sol?

Clothes

Shopping for clothes is a mixed bag. The first point is that the climate means that you immediately save on the need to have a totally different winter and summer wardrobe. For most of the year what would be regarded as summer clothes in the UK can be worn here. Women are certainly less likely to feel the need to buy a new winter coat on a regular basis and for men there is far less need to wear tailored suits or formal shirts even for business. This is an immediate saving.

During the summer months everyone tends to live in shorts and T-shirts and these can be bought very cheaply in the local markets if all you want (or need) is the basics. In fact we know many people here who go to the local market in the spring and buy a supply of T-shirts for that year at very good prices and at the end of the summer season they just throw them away and start all over again the following year.

If you happen to be a label freak – which I once was – then you will find that designer clothes in Spain can be expensive, possibly more so than in the UK, since you need to go to the large department stores to find them and, with less competition, prices can be high.

Shoes

The undoubted bargain in Spain is shoes. They are beautifully made and you can choose to buy them on the market, in the supermarkets or in the department stores. Wherever you buy the quality will be excellent for the price paid and the choice will be very wide indeed. The other major bargain in the shoe stakes is sandals. So many people wear them through the spring, summer and autumn with the result that there is a huge and very competitive market, which results in the prices being one third to one half of the prices in the UK. Never bring sandals with you from England to the Costa del Sol.

Household goods

Household linen, towels and similar items are considerably cheaper. When we first moved here we had an apartment which we rented out for holidays and we decided that the one thing renters would appreciate would be good bed linen and towels. It actually cost very little to supply this and the quality was good. Another positive is that when buying ready-made curtains they are normally sold singly – you then buy the number of individual curtains that are necessary for the size of your window.

Electrical goods are likely to be much cheaper than they are in the UK and it is probably not worth the cost of transporting them to Spain. Certainly, when it comes to items like washing machines, your UK model may not work here. Most properties are set up for cold fill only for washing machines so many UK machines, which need a hot and cold fill, will not operate in Spain. Other white goods are very well priced and there is a lot of competition between the various stores, which helps to keep the prices low. British televisions will work if your signal source is UK-based satellite, but you may have problems if you want to watch Spanish television on a standard aerial. Televisions in Spain are very competitively priced and, once more, there is a very wide choice.

Smaller electrical items are probably priced on a par with the UK now. Similarly CDs, DVDs and videos are really no different in price here than they are back in England and if you want a very wide choice of entertainment software you are probably better advised to buy it on the Internet if you have access. The choice is greater and the prices are lower even if you have to pay for postage and packing and deliveries are usually within a few days.

Furniture

Furniture in this part of Spain may appear to be potentially more expensive than in the UK, mainly due to the fact that there are not so many shops selling flat-packed furniture. However the furniture stores on the Costa del Sol are actually very stylish and if you accept that you are buying good design and very well made items then the prices do not seem to be so high.

Cars

Cars in Spain were much cheaper at one time, but the differences have been eroded as the prices in the UK have dropped. Now there is really very little difference in the prices of most mainstream models. The one thing that is less well developed in Spain is the second-hand car market. The main dealers obviously have second-hand vehicles for sale but there are far fewer secondhand car dealers since the transfer of vehicles from one person to another is more complicated because of the tax situation. The local population tend to drive their cars into the ground, and then they replace them or use them as a down payment for finance on a new car.

Car servicing is considerably cheaper than we were accustomed to when we lived in the SE of England, even in the main dealerships. Overall, the cost of running a car here is much lower since apart from buying, servicing and repairs, fuel is about one third cheaper than it is in the UK.

Markets

The various markets that exist along the coast are a very real part of life. Depending on where you live there will be a market close by virtually every day of the week. If you visit several in succession you will soon realise that it is the same market traders who move from one town to another during the course of a week but they can be a wonderful place to shop for the essentials of life.

The merchandise on offer ranges from fruit and vegetables of the most incredible quality grown locally, to the entire range of household necessities like towels and bed linen, all very competitively priced. You will also find shoe sellers and a wide range of clothing (much of it pirated designer-label clothes). Due to the closeness of the Costa del Sol to Africa there will also be many stalls selling goods of North African origin – ornaments, pottery, rugs and even wall fountains. The prices are competitive, but if you really want to buy products made in Morocco it would probably be cheaper to make the day trip to Tangier and buy direct. These markets are also the only places in mainland Europe where I have seen fake watches and pirated CDs and DVDs sold so openly.

Strangely, many of these markets do not sell meat, fish or cheese.