Rental Advice - Spanish Homeowners

Keys and Handovers

When your guests have booked and paid for their holiday, it then becomes time to arrange for them to be able to get into your Spanish holiday home when they arrive. There are a number of ways you can pass keys to your guests and arrange for regular checks on the contents between bookings.

One option, if you live near to your property, is to do the work yourself. If this is not possible then you will need to consider using your cleaner or property management company as a meet and greet service. Another method is to ask a trusted friend who lives locally to help out - for a small fee.

Property management companies will generally offer key holding services and are a good, professional choice for 'Meet and Greet' services as they have offices locally and are a good point of contact for guests if there are problems which need rectifying. Have a look through our Business and Services directory for cleaners and property management companies in your area.

Posting the keys to your guests is another simple way to hand them over and usually works well, although you should remember to post them well in advance of your guests' holiday so they receive them before they leave. Keys should be sent via recorded delivery if possible as this adds an extra security element into the equation. Call your guests a few days after you've posted the keys to make sure they've received them and arrange to send another set if not. It's always a good idea to leave a set of keys with someone you trust who lives locally as a back up just in case your guests happen to lose theirs whilst they're on holiday.

Key safes at the property are another tried and trusted method of key handover. The modern type which have combination locks are a great way to avoid losing keys as all you need to do is let your guests know the combination to open it before they depart. Reprogrammable key safes are the best bet for higher security as the combination can be changed after each changeover.

Important Notes About Keys

During the course of a year, there will be many people who will be in possession of the keys to your holiday home in Spain. It follows then that a few security precautions should be adhered to and the first, most obvious is to NEVER send your keys to anyone, however much they complain, until you have been paid in full for the booking and it is cleared in your account. Check with your bank to make sure the payment has cleared and is available funds. Another possibly less obvious security measure, is to avoid making it easy to see that the keys are for your property by not displaying the address on the keyring.