Any advice on starting a business in Crete?

[DobbyTheHouseElf]

Can I get any loans or grants?especially as its a project benefitting the enviroment.

[filippos]

First you'll need to get relevant documentation and set up a business which can involve a deal of red tape and some expense. It's highly unlikely there will be any grants and you may struggle to get a bank loan. I recommend you consult a good accountant. Running a business without the appropriate approval/paperwork and get caught can be eye-wateringly expensive. My wife gave up her business when she was required to pay something like €250 per month into a pension scheme when already receiving a private pension and UK State pension.

[Jeffstclair]

Speak to your accountant is the only advice I can give you ,good luck with it ..

[paul g]

you should check with a psychiatrist about masochistic tendencies.

[Kilkis]

Stavros is.a self employed insurance agent on Crete. You might find it instructive to read his post on the amount of tax he pays in this thread: viewtopic.php?f=7&t=10483

Warwick

[STEVE.W]

Best advice, don't do it! See this article http://www.ekathimerini.com/228366/arti ... -month-net

[YoMo2]

Best advice, don't do it! See this article http://www.ekathimerini.com/228366/arti ... -month-net

Agreed. Unlikely to be worth the hassle....

Andrew

[Ornitorinco]

Hey!
As i know, with all the scepticism around it, the best way to do business in Greece now - is investing in the real estate or any redevelopment progects. The market is in very good position right now, so the rent of a flat can help you to make money and later, when the price will grow, you can sell it with the profit. At least there-re many analitics, who are suggesting this.
"Prices for property in Greece are about 40% below their peak in 2008. Tranio expects prices to grow in the next 2–3 years for two reasons. First, Greece is experiencing a boom in tourism. According to the Bank of Greece, the number of international tourists, who create short-term rental property demand, grew from 15 million in 2009 to 30 million in 2017. Second, the Greek economy is in recovery. The country’s GDP grew for four straight quarters in 2017, and the European Commission expects the economy to grow by 2.5% per annum in 2018 and 2019." proof

[Kilkis]

While I don't disagree with the figures you post I would still advise caution. The market does appear to be bottoming out but it may be a false bottom.

Greek banks have over 40 % non-performing loans and many of those are mortgages. Despite a lot of pressure from Greece's creditors, so far there has been great reluctance to resolve this issue, i.e. sell the non-performing loans to investment companies for a fraction of their face value or foreclose on them. The two solutions could amount to the same thing as the institutions buying the NPLs could also foreclose. If a large number of distressed properties appeared on the market in a short space of time it could force the bottom lower.

Obviously any investment company buying NPLs wants to achieve as much profit as possible but if they buy the loans at 20 % of their face value, which seems typical, quickly selling on the properties for 40 % of their peak value could still earn them a decent profit. Also foreclosing and running a fire sale at similar levels might net the banks more than selling the distressed debt. Either way the current apparent bottom may prove to be an illusion.

As a concrete example: suppose someone bought a property near the peak of the market for €200,000, all of which was on a mortgage, and they are no longer able to pay the monthly repayments. Lets say in today's market the house is nominally worth €120,000, i.e. 40 % down, but would take a long time to sell at that price. The bank might sell your NPL to an investment company for €40,000 and the investment company might foreclose on your mortgage and put the house on the market for €80,000 to get a quick sale. They have made 100 % profit in a very short time so are delighted. Alternatively the bank might foreclose and put the house on the market for €80,000 recovering them double what they would get from selling the NPL. Either way it wouldn't take many sales at these levels to make a big dent in the current market price. Unrealistic number? I don't know but so far most of the NPLs sold are unsecured loans and they have been selling for between 3 % and 5.5 % of their face value. I have a strong feeling that 20 % of face value would be an upper bound for secured loans.

I am sure eventually everything will return to somewhere near normal and investors today can make a profit BUT you need to be certain that you can leave the investment longer term to avoid having to sell at a possible loss in the short term.

Warwick

[bobscott]

especially as its a project benefitting the enviroment.

Benefiting the environment - in what way? Bob.

[DobbyTheHouseElf]

especially as its a project benefitting the enviroment.

Benefiting the environment - in what way? Bob.

Setting up a briquette making factory to turn waste from the olive trees into fire bricks.Instead of all the olive oil farmers burning all their waste from the tree pruning and the olive picking - the small branches and leaves - shred them into biomass then press it into briquettes for burning in fireplaces or small boilers .It would dramatically reduce the number of out of control wildfires that the fire service have to deal with at great expense each year ,saving the Greek taxpayer alot of money.The number of out of control fires created by farmers would be greatly reduced if we could presuade them to deliver their waste or have it collected by us! The madness is Crete imports million of fire briquettes each year from Sweden yet the material is here already lying on the ground but just gets burnt each year because there is no co-ordination or organisation between the small farmers.For them the cheapest solution is to burn on the roadside.There is probably an outlay of 25,000 minimum for starting off , then to find a large premise with enough storage area for a large amount of Biomass and a good watering system and large covered area for the biomass maker and the briquette making machines .Maybe to two to start with then going up to five or six.The cheapest are Chinese about 3,000 euros each at a rough estimate ( not including delivery?)but the quality does not look that brilliant in the photos.But is it all worth the effort if we are just going to be taxed to no profit if the scheme is sucessful?.

[TweetTweet]

Most wild fires are caused due to lightening, sometimes a thoughtlessly discarded fag by a tourist or other, and/or a deliberate act to try and circumvent planning rules around *forest areas* plus of course sometimes due to the deranged mental faculties of the pyro-maniac.

Generally speaking, olive farmers burn their debris from the harvest (between late October and early March) at the same time as they prune their trees (harvest time). Some farmers understand that collecting the small stuff is uneconomic (to provide raw material for your briquets). Their scolution is to either leave the debris or (very often) bring in a machine that pounds up and down the olive lines and *macerates* said debris. I believe this latter solution can attract some kind of susidy because it is seems as organic (I've heard that but don't know for sure).

Another thing is that many olive farmers also have goats and sheep to feed - the prunings get loaded on to tractors and taken away.

I am not clear what business you would like to start - ?

[DobbyTheHouseElf]

Most wild fires are caused due to lightening, sometimes a thoughtlessly discarded fag by a tourist or other, and/or a deliberate act to try and circumvent planning rules around *forest areas* plus of course sometimes due to the deranged mental faculties of the pyro-maniac.

Generally speaking, olive farmers burn their debris from the harvest (between late October and early March) at the same time as they prune their trees (harvest time). Some farmers understand that collecting the small stuff is uneconomic (to provide raw material for your briquets). Their scolution is to either leave the debris or (very often) bring in a machine that pounds up and down the olive lines and *macerates* said debris. I believe this latter solution can attract some kind of susidy because it is seems as organic (I've heard that but don't know for sure).

Another thing is that many olive farmers also have goats and sheep to feed - the prunings get loaded on to tractors and taken away.

I am not clear what business you would like to start - ?

It is quite clear in my comment above -"Setting up a Briquette making factory to turn waste from Olive trees into fire bricks.... for burning in household fires or in small boilers" ! Most prunings are burnt on the roadside or left on the ground ,not everybody owns goats and sheep. .The MAJORITY of sheep and goats are semi wild and loose in remote areas and are not likely to be rounded up from the top of a mountain to eat an few leaves.Besides they can only eat fresh leaves anyway and the leaves do not stay fresh very long after cutting .A SMALL amount are kept in houses or on farms to provide milk or meat to the people who live there.There arent enough sheep and goats on the whole island to eat all the biomass waste produced anyway! .There is NO subsidy for crunching the waste up on the ground with machinery .Organic or not .We do not prune during harvest time ,a tiny amount is under taken ,but we do the main pruning usually a week after the harvesting finishes .Some fires but not all are caused by olive tree farmers burning their waste and the fire becoming out of control during or shortly after the times of harvesting and pruning- from October to March.

[mouche]

Most wildfires seem to occur during rather windy days, wonder why? Not!

[Jeffstclair]

Sounds like a good plan , I've tried on a small scale making faggots out of prunings an they work very well put a couple in the wood stove in the morning while the tea is brewing and bingo instant heat .. I have also tried pyrini compressed into blocks for the stove but they were very labour intensive to produce they burnt well and produced a load of heat ...maybe a mix of prunings and pyrini compressed would be good ...When I prune my trees most of the prunings get turned into fire wood and the rest goes to my neighbours goats or sheep ...they eat the leaves plus truck loads from the olive oil press most of the winter ... But like you say the vast majority of the prunings ( and loads of good fire wood) just get burnt on site , transporting truck loads to a central point is gonna be a massive expense ... maybe a mobile system ?...