La Mata awoke on Monday, 13th July, to several closed streets, specifically those surrounding the “ghost” Sole Bello hotel on Avenida del Mar, located just metres from the beach and the town square of this district of Torrevieja. Around 9:00 am, a significant deployment of the Guardia Civil, consisting of approximately 60 officers from Alicante, Torrevieja, and even Valencia, was already in place to carry out the eviction of the building. This generated considerable interest among residents in an operation that ultimately proceeded without incident.
Some residents had already left, while many others gradually emerged onto the streets. Some left with only the clothes on their backs, while others brought their belongings, including suitcases, mattresses, clotheslines, fans, flowerpots, chairs, and even playground equipment, cribs, and toys. Among the evicted families, totalling some 50 people, there were many children.
Those affected showed their rental contracts and payment receipts. Through tears, they emphasised that they were not squatters, but victims of fraud. One of the most repeated messages was that they were families with nowhere else to live, alongside demands for a solution to avoid becoming homeless, reminding everyone that in the middle of summer prices skyrocket, sometimes reaching the cost of a week’s rent compared to their usual monthly rent.
Consequently, while the eviction was being completed by bricking up the entrances to the building, some of them were left at the doors of what had been their home in recent months, enduring temperatures exceeding 30 degrees and a heat index of almost 40.
With nowhere to go and only the clothes on her back, Carmen, a 75-year-old woman with mobility issues, found herself stranded. She had required help to get down three flights of stairs because the lift was not working. Since November, she had been living with her two daughters and two granddaughters in one of the 49 rooms, which featured kitchens and bathrooms, having been converted from an aparthotel into apartments for rent at up to 750 euro a month, plus electricity, water, and internet. Carmen lamented between sobs that she did not even grab her clothes or her phone because she was told to step outside for a moment and was then unable to get back in.
Some had even paid several months in advance, as shown in the documents, and were now on the street, including a Colombian woman who has lived in Spain for four years and has been registered since March in this same hotel where she lived with her three daughters aged two, three, and six, as well as Marina, who is from Ukraine.
Another of those affected stated that they are people, not animals, insisting that they had submitted a letter with dozens of signatures to the City Council general registry on June 22nd. They had asked for more time to find somewhere else to go, explaining that they have a long-term rental contract that they are paying religiously and are in a situation of extreme vulnerability. Lacking another home or any form of help, they requested to postpone the eviction to allow them to find affordable housing.
Municipal sources explained that those affected must follow the established procedures to request assistance from social services, assuring that the City Council has provided one of the families with accommodation in Guardamar del Segura and is attempting to rehouse another.
In the existing lease agreements, some of which were for two more years, Mazart Global Group, based in Pilar de la Horadada, appears as the lessee, although the contracts are fraudulent as the tenant, acting through front men, did not own the property. The document states that the company has possession and the right to operate the hotel, and that in its legal capacity as lessor, it leases the property solely and exclusively for residential use.
The clauses include the landlord’s obligation to comply with the rules and agreements of the homeowners’ association, to notify the occupants of the property, and to be responsible for any damages. It also specifies that payment must be made in cash, and that penalties for non-payment include late payment interest or eviction. Furthermore, it stipulates the payment of one month’s rent as a security deposit and an additional month’s rent for the intermediary agency as a management and mediation fee. However, the contracts, written in Russian and Spanish, do not list the characteristics of the homes or their square footage, nor do they mention that they are rooms in an aparthotel.
The court notice, issued by the civil section of the Court of First Instance of Torrevieja, with a resolution signed by the judge of square number 4, arrived on 11th June for the closure of the establishment. It warned guests and occupants that they had to leave the premises this Monday at 9:15 am; otherwise, the eviction by public force would take place, with all goods remaining inside becoming the property of the owner.
The order stems from a court-ordered enforcement action initiated by the company Eurointerfisa, which is the name appearing on the licence issued by the Torrevieja City Council in 2018, still displayed in the hotel lobby as the owner. During the eviction proceedings, the court learned that the property was occupied by third parties and convened a hearing for them to provide proof of their legal right to remain there.
Several hotel guests then presented valid rental agreements signed with Mazart Global Group. However, the judge rejected them because, according to the ruling, there was no record of what legal basis this company had to lease the property, since the right to operate the hotel belonged solely and exclusively to Eurointerfisa.
The eviction, a judicial action by which the delivery of a property or establishment is carried out to the person who has that right recognised in a judicial resolution, in practice means putting an end to the occupation of the affected space.
Representatives of the property owners told this newspaper that they had been involved in legal proceedings for seven years to evict the person who had rented the hotel but was not paying anything, not even taxes. Meanwhile, the same sources asserted he was also subletting rooms using fraudulent contracts. They added that there was a small fire the night before the eviction. Neighbours in the area witnessed a large number of trucks coming and going until after 1:00 am because, they claimed, everything had been taken, from the mattresses to the industrial kitchen of the establishment.
The Hotel Sole Bello is still officially listed as a three-star establishment in the records of the Valencian Regional Government. It operated normally from its construction in the 2000s until the pandemic. At that time, rental agreements began to be signed that were later proven fraudulent by individuals unrelated to the original owners, who reported the matter.
This lease, arranged through intermediaries who personally demanded payment from the tenants, including for electricity, internet, and water consumption, which was estimated at a fixed amount since there were no individual meters, had created a peculiar situation in the building itself. The property maintained the appearance of a hotel, with its doors wide open, the reception area empty, and the dining rooms and lounges closed, but it was occupied by residents.
In recent months, residents of La Mata have also reported an alleged increase in security problems around the property, which has supposedly become the base of a group of people involved in crime, including robberies and purse snatchings.
The Guardia Civil, National Police, Local Police, and the Generalitat’s inspection service acted jointly last Tuesday, June 2nd, to verify the condition of the property following public concern caused by numerous complaints related to the activity surrounding the establishment. The eviction order was signed by the judge two days later.
Other neighbours stated that the building’s residents were not causing any problems. However, the tenants themselves noticed that people without contracts had moved in and were causing conflicts, thefts, noise at night, and suspected drug dealing.