Frequently
asked

01What does MASR Architects do?

MASR Arquitectos | Architects is an architecture and engineering studio based in Altea, on the Costa Blanca. We design and build single-family homes, new construction, renovations, interior design, urban planning and commercial projects across the Marina Baja and the Province of Alicante.

Every project is developed with BIM (Building Information Modeling) methodology, and we apply bioclimatic design and the Passivhaus (passive house) standard when the client or the project calls for it.

02Where is the studio and which area do you cover?

The studio is at Paseo del Mediterráneo 1, 03590 Altea (Alicante, Spain). We work across the Costa Blanca and the Province of Alicante: Altea, Alfaz del Pi, La Nucía, Polop, Calpe, Benissa, Moraira, Finestrat and Callosa d'en Sarrià, plus Jávea, Dénia and neighbouring municipalities.

Office hours: Monday to Friday, 10:00 — 18:00. Visits by appointment.

03What awards has MASR received?

The studio has been honoured in two consecutive editions of the Luxury Lifestyle Awards:

• Luxury Lifestyle Awards 2023 — Architecture (Single Residential), Alicante, Spain.
• Luxury Lifestyle Awards 2022 — Residential Architecture, Alicante, Spain.

04Do you work with BIM and Passivhaus?

Yes. Every project is modelled end-to-end in BIM, which delivers precise drawings, anticipates construction conflicts and keeps a tight grip on timelines and budgets during site supervision.

We apply bioclimatic design and the Passivhaus (passive house) standard to minimise energy use and maximise indoor comfort — especially relevant in the Mediterranean climate of the Costa Blanca, where orientation, shading and the thermal inertia of the walls make the difference between a house that breathes and one that needs constant climate control.

05What kind of projects do you take on?

We work across the full chain of technical services in the real-estate sector:

• Architecture — single-family new construction, full renovation, interior design, urban planning, commercial and industrial architecture.
• Engineering — structural calculations, MEP installations (electrical, plumbing, HVAC, renewables), technical reports.
• Construction — site management, full refurbishment, façades, rehabilitation.
• Permits and certificates — planning permission, legalisations, second occupancy, energy certificate, building inspection report and land-registry documentation. Each one has its own page in the services index, and the most asked about are covered in questions 06, 07 and 08.
• Advisory — an architect consultation by phone or at the office, an architect visit on site, and technical support for notary and Land Registry. We do not do valuations: putting a market value on a property is a different job, and an approved valuer signs it.

06What certificates do you issue and what are they for?

We issue the technical certificates typically required for a property transaction, a refurbishment or a residential rental in Spain. Each one has its own page with the full detail:

Energy Performance Certificate (CEE)

Mandatory document for selling or renting any property in Spain. It rates the building's energy use on an A–G scale and proposes improvements. It requires a visit to the property within the three months before it is issued, and what gives it legal force is registration with the regional registry, which we handle. It expires after ten years, or five if the rating is G.

Descriptive and age certificate

It answers two questions about a house: exactly what has been built — built and usable areas, layout, materials — and since when. The notary asks for it when the deed still describes an older version of the property instead of what stands on the ground. It is issued stamped by the Architects' Association.

Describing is not legalising, and confusing the two is expensive: the certificate does not judge whether what was built complies with planning law. A building can be perfectly described in the deed and still be out of ordinance.

And how far it goes with the Land Registry

The age certificate allows an old building to be entered in the Land Registry through the declaration of new construction by antiquity (declaración de obra nueva por antigüedad), which article 28.4 of the Spanish Land Act permits once the deadlines for restoring planning legality have expired. In the Valencian Community that deadline is fifteen years from full completion of the works — article 255 of the TRLOTUP.

But that clock does not always run, and this is the nuance that causes the most trouble. Paragraph 5 of the same article rules it out over green zones, roads, open spaces or public facilities, over assets in the public domain or listed in the General Inventory of Valencian Cultural Heritage, and over non-developable land — drawing no distinction between ordinary and protected. In all those cases the administration's power to act never lapses, and a good share of the old undocumented houses in this area sit precisely on rural land.

The other two most often asked for

Second occupancy — what many people still call the habitability certificate — and the building inspection report, mandatory once the building turns fifty. The rest is in the services index.

07What are IVG, ICUC and georeferenced coordinates?

These are three technical instruments the Spanish Land Registry and notaries require to register or regularise properties. We draft and sign them as authorised technicians, from our own survey on site:

ICUC · Cadastral Report on the Location of Constructions

It looks at the building: it checks with coordinates whether the buildings, the pool and the ancillary structures fall inside the plot as the Cadastre has it drawn. This is what the Land Registry asks for whenever a deed is amended by description or by antiquity. It comes out positive or negative, and negative does not mean the house encroaches on the neighbour: it almost always means the cadastral cartography is carrying an imprecise drawing from decades ago.

IVG · Graphic Validation Report

It looks at the plot: it fixes with UTM coordinates in the ETRS89 system where its boundaries, its shape and its area actually are, and validates that this geometry fits the neighbouring plots. It is used when the cadastral cartography does not match reality and an alternative graphic representation has to be registered. Hence the two are often ordered in that sequence: a negative ICUC is followed by an IVG showing that the real boundary is a different one and that the building was always inside it.

Georeferenced coordinates: when they are actually required

Two things get mixed up here constantly, and getting it wrong means paying for a survey that was not needed — or falling short before the registrar.

• In a declaration of new construction, article 202 of the Spanish Mortgage Act requires the portion of land occupied by the building to be identified by coordinates. Not the whole plot.
• The georeferenced graphic representation of the plot is mandatory only in the cases listed in article 9.b: first registration, parcelling, re-parcelling, land consolidation, sub-division, division, aggregation, merger, compulsory purchase and boundary demarcation. That is, whenever the shape of the plot is touched or it is registered for the first time.

Which is why the usual order is descriptive certificate and ICUC first, and the IVG only if it is needed. We capture the coordinates with a GNSS receiver and, depending on what the terrain calls for, with a LIDAR scanner or a drone.

08Do you handle urbanistic legalisations?

Yes. We assist the owner through the whole process, from initial review to entry in the Land Registry. And the first step is always the same: request the planning report and check whether what has been built fits what the planning rules allow on that plot. Sometimes it fits; sometimes it fits only in part, and legalising then means demolishing the excess; sometimes it does not fit at all. That is said before anything is drafted, not after.

Building legalisation

The project that brings what was built without a permit into line with the planning rules, before the town hall. It ends in the corresponding authorisation and in the occupancy of the property.

And here is the part that costs the most to ignore: lapsed is not resolved. Fifteen years having passed means you can no longer be fined or ordered to demolish, not that the building is legal. Article 256 of the TRLOTUP puts it plainly: while the breach persists, no works of refurbishment, extension or consolidation may be carried out on what was built illegally — and the town hall will grant no further permits — second occupancy falling with them — until it is legalised.

Declaration of new construction by antiquity

This is the Land Registry route, not the planning one, and they are different things. For buildings completed years ago and never registered, we draft the descriptive and age certificate and the supporting documentation the notary and the Land Registry require. It updates the deed; it does not put the building right with the town hall.

Buildings out of ordinance

Valencian law does not use the «assimilated to out-of-ordinance» figure found in other Spanish regions. What exists here is article 206 of the TRLOTUP, and it draws a distinction worth keeping straight, because the room for works is not the same:

• Out of ordinance proper: declared as such by the plan for manifest incompatibility with its provisions, or by occupying the roads or open spaces the plan provides for. There, only pure maintenance works are authorised.
• Non-conforming buildings that are not out of ordinance: the house was built legally and the rules changed afterwards. For these the plan must set a transitional regime in which works of refurbishment and improvement are allowed, provided they do not deepen the mismatch with the planning in force nor amount to rebuilding the non-conforming elements entirely.

What we do is review the applicable planning, certify the state of the building and handle before the town hall whatever each case calls for.

Adapting to current regulations

Drafting refurbishment, renovation or adaptation projects when the building needs to meet current codes on habitability, safety, energy efficiency or accessibility — by planning permission or by responsible declaration, depending on what is being touched.

Change of use

Turning a commercial unit into a home, or adapting a property to commercial or industrial use, is a planning change of use: it goes by responsible declaration accompanied by a certification, with a project behind it.

Renting a home out by the day is not, and the confusion is common. There is no change of use and no licence: what is needed is a favourable municipal planning compatibility report and, with it, a responsible declaration before the tourism authority. We explain it on the tourist rental licence page.

Sub-division, aggregation and horizontal division

Technical documentation to amend the legal regime of plots and buildings, with the georeferenced graphic representation the Land Registry requires. On rural land a second rule applies, agricultural rather than planning — the minimum cultivation unit — and the town hall's permit does not resolve it. It is set out on the plot division or merger page.

09How do I get in touch with MASR?

• Email: info@masr.es
• Phone: +34 644 722 099
• Office: Paseo del Mediterráneo 1, 03590 Altea (Alicante, Spain)
• Hours: Monday to Friday, 10:00 — 18:00
• Form: at the bottom of the home page

Last updated · 27 August 2026