my husband & i are moving to madrid in the beginning of january [courtesy of the us army] & i had a concern about our car..

is it common for american cars to fall victim of break ins? [more so than a european car, i mean.]

i know a car is almost pointless, in my opinion, in madrid because of the mass transportation, but we would still like to bring it with us.

thank you for any information!

You know , Vanbags , I almost never see foreign numberplates here in 5 years of being in Madrid . Sometimes , maybe , a Portuguese one but nothing else and so if your car has US numberplates then it will be very noticeable ! It would also depend on where you live in Madrid . If it was somewhere like Getafe or Alcorcon then it would be a bigger risk than , say , upmarket areas such as La Moraleja or Goya .
Well now that explains the picture on your facebook account ! He must be a fairly high rank with all those colours on his lapel !
I have friends in the USAF and when they were stationed for a few years in England , the military arranged for the whole move from Texas ... including a car . That´s very impressive ( and respectful since they´d served time in Afghanistan ) of the US military . I look forward , maybe , to meeting you guys one day here in Madrid .
By the way , when I stayed on an army base ( NATO ) in Germany my friend who was an officer had her car from England .. Every morning we had to check under the car for possible explosives . I think , now , in Germany they change the license plates to look like they´re from Germany .
I also have a friend here from the Spanish Army . He´s a staff seargeant .. 29 years old .. very smart .. Maybe you´ll get to meet him too !

thank you for your response, steve robinson. the reason i asked was because an old friend was stationed outside of madrid a while back & he said he had broken windows & all of that almost on a monthly basis. i know our insurance would take care of it, but its just not something i want to deal with.

we also dont know where we'll be living yet, not until my husband finds out where he'll be working, but thank you for the suggestions.

i suppose that facebook picture does make his uniform look pretty fancy, but he's not high ranking. he's a specialist, hoping to make sergeant after a few months in madrid. this coming march would be his 3 year mark in the army & a promotion would be the best!

i have 2 friends stationed in germany right now & that sort of thing [possible car explosives] is unheard of. plus, they live on an actual military post so it's mostly americans anyway. [not saying americans don't create explosives..]

Just to clarify .. My friend was working on a NATO base so lot´s of Americans too !! But the main check of the car was when we RETURNED to the base . At the time the IRA were very prolific and many bombs had been exploded in the UK so they ere on a high alert at the time . I wish your husband best of luck in reaching his promotion !