TV programme highlights the Priors’ housing horror

THE Channel 5 show Horror Homes last night brought to the fore once again the plight of the Priors, whose dream home in Vera, Almeria was demolished in front of their eyes in 2008.

The so-called ‘planning irregularities’ that led to Len and Helen Prior being robbed of their dreams, their life savings, and their security, are still being contested as compensation claims remain unpaid.

Len said on the show, “As the bulldozers came up the drive, my emotions overtook me and I just passed out, that’s all I remember.”

The unsympathetic law, which took no account of the fact that the Priors had the correct paperwork signed off from the town hall, said that the land on which the house was built had previously been designated as ‘rural,’ and therefore was not allowed to have a building on it.

The Priors are not the only people to suffer in this way at the hands of Spanish planning irregularities, with an estimated 300,000 properties across Andalucia affected.

The law has recently been revised a little in favour of duped home owners, entitling them to compensation before demolition. However, that change will be of little condolence to the Priors having lived a seven-year nightmare.

BULLDOZED: The Priors’ home is demolished.