[dosland]

Your experience with nut width preference and flat fingerboard preference is pretty common for people who are new to nylon - the expectation is that a 'much' wider nut and a flat fretboard will feel like a cricket bat, but the reality is that, given the size of the strings and the lower tension, a lot of people won't experience a huge and distressing difference. Personally, I never even thought about (or knew about?) different nut widths or fretboard radii until I started putzing around on the internet 12 years after I started playing guitars. I had an electric and a classical and an acoustic-electric and gave and took lessons on some of them and never once thought about nuts and radii. So naïve... I DID think about intonation and fret buzz, so those are things I tried to deal with in all sorts of aways. I have played quite a few Almansa guitars (about 8 years ago, though), and I thought they were fine instruments all around. The finish details were sometimes inconsistent - a flaw in the finish here or there, some sloppiness on the inside (I don't care at all about that), the occasional blemish - but overall, well-built, pleasant instruments to play. I don't consider a truss-rod or lack thereof to be a deal-breaker in the nylon world, especially in the budget range (which is where I live). But if you're looking at spending up to $2K CDN, I think you should be able to find a fantastic Cordoba or Alhambra or even Almansa for that kind of money. The Cordoba, at least, will have a truss-rod. I don't think Alhambras usually have them, but they almost all have an ebony reinforcement down the neck, which may count for something. I think the student/studio/concert Almansas will also have a neck reinforcement.

The intonation on the instrument you're looking at may be a bit wonky, but it may also be that you're hearing minute differences due to different finger pressures and string tensions, especially if the overall intonation at 12 is pretty close to correct. Left (and right, but especially left) hand technique has to be oh-so-precise on a classical guitar to get everything to go correctly. Fret too hard you pull sharp. Fret too soft you buzz. Improper position, you pull sharp. Play too fast they slap your wrist (that's not really the guitar's fault, at least). I think the fat strings and the lower tension introduce a lot more room for error than on steelies.

A few nylon guitars that I've played have a 'dramatically' compensated saddle to deal with the g-issue that you've noted. I'm incompetent, but I still make my own saddles for my guitars, because even though I can barely play, I imagine it matters somehow. I just bought a yamaha cs40 and I'm going to put a handmade bone saddle in that sometime before Christmas. Incidentally, for NZ $170, this thing plays like a champ!

Other things before I go back to work: Spanish classicals and those built in their tradition tend to be lighter.

Bass strings tend to be 'easy' on a classical - it's getting the trebles and the mids to really ring out forever and ever that seems to take a lot more building nous. Someone else will know more about this than I do, but that has been my experience.

Good luck in your search, my gut feeling would be to return the Almansa you bought right now, if you have the cash on hand to go for significantly higher grade instrument and you're ready to spend - no sense keeping the 'cheapo' unless you're going to give it a few good years, in my view.