Not surprised with your success in this arena after reading about your other exploits.

I think your agent is just telling you what the market is doing.You might find you need to exploit another type of product in this market if that one is too frothy.I work on millions to multi-millions in commercial deals but I do look at what 2 to 4 units trade at in good areas.

If you rely on others to find your opportunities, such as on-market listing(s) on MLS, there's rarely enough difference between listing price and  market price to produce a realistic profit margin in a strong, stabil market.Auctions and foreclosure sale sometimes produce good opportunities for profit, but again the nearly perfect availability of information among buyers leave much of the high-profit deals to bidders who study and exploit time and missing or erroneous data opportunities.The alternatives include off-market properties, meaning approaching sellers who have not listed, which includes but not limited to absentee owners, probate, and tracking distress scenarios such as mortgage and tax defaults prior to sale.

My idea was to start buying close to the city center a small flat, so in case I don't get easily a long term rental I can exploit it as tourist apartment. 

Find a better list of owners with triggers that you can identify, exacerbate their concern for the problems and exploit the opertunity. 

There are a couple of points that are making Spain an interesting market to invest in:- there are still a lot of investment opportunities as investing in real estate is not as popular/exploited as in the US- prices are generally lower than in the US (/or Northern Europe where I am originally from) so the same euro/dollar earned in the US can be put easier to work and more divided into more projects- if you understand investing you will probably beat the competition quite easy because there are a lot of not well-presented properties for sale and for rent- good yields are possible with traditional and especially coliving and tourist rentals- getting financing is easy however for cash-out refinances etc you will need to become a bit more creativeAnd besides the numbers let's not forget the country, culture, food, quality of life and especially the sun (although in LA this wouldn't be something to complain about either ;-)).

So it is the Contractors that are exploiting them because it is a cash job.

Brandon did a blog post on this about a year ago: http://www.biggerpockets.com/renewsblog/2012/10/21/are-you-a-slumlord/Here's Wikipedia's definition along with Brandon's take:Wikipedia defines “Slumlord” as “a derogatory term for landlords, generally absentee landlords, who attempt to maximize profit by minimizing spending on property maintenance, often in deteriorating neighborhoods.”Brandon went on...The truer definition of slumlord, I believe, is “a derogatory term for landlords, generally absentee landlords, who attempt to exploit tenants and maximize profits by refusing to spend on property maintenance, often in deteriorating neighborhoods.”

We have seen the low hanging fruit exploited. 

Is there a different mindset when they are used for nonprofits as opposed to for profits that have the look of exploiting people.