Andalusia is home to four of the ten towns and cities with the highest household effort to rent a home, according to a study published by idealista. The average household income and the cost of housing are the key factors determining the effort a household must make to secure a rental property.
Benahavís (Málaga) is the Spanish town where local households face the greatest effort to access rental housing, with 90% of the average household income required. It is followed by Santa Eulalia del Río in Ibiza (74%) and the Málaga towns of Marbella and Estepona (72% in both cases), with similar rates recorded in the Alicante town Finestrat and the Balearic island town Calvià (71% in both). Next are two Canarian towns: Arona (69%) and Adeje (68%), along with Benidorm in Alicante (67%) and the Málaga town of Casares (66%).
Ciudad Real and Baeza require the least household effort to pay the rent
The towns or cities requiring the least effort to rent a home are spread across five autonomous communities, primarily located inland. The cities of Ciudad Real and Baeza in Jaén have the lowest ratio between rental costs and household income, with only 16% of household income needed to cover rent.
They are followed by the towns of Linares (Córdoba), Puertollano (Ciudad Real), Benicarló (Castellón) and Jaén, where 17% of income is allocated to rent. Four additional towns have rates of 19%: Ponferrada (León), Palencia, Alcoy (Alicante) and Plasencia (Cáceres).
The towns with the highest and lowest rental effort in each autonomous community
The study also highlights the markets requiring the most and least effort in each autonomous community, revealing significant disparities. For instance, the most demanding market in Andalusia (Benahavís) requires almost 70 percentage points more household income than the most demanding market in Extremadura (Badajoz, at 19%).
In contrast, differences among the least demanding markets are smaller. The least demanding market in the Balearic Islands (Llucmajor) requires 46% of household income, while Andalusia and Castile-La Mancha have the lowest rates, with Baeza and Ciudad Real both at 16%.
Due to the limited sample size in Cantabria, Navarra and La Rioja, the effort rate could only be calculated in their capitals. As a result, Santander, Pamplona and Logroño are listed as the markets with the highest and lowest effort rates to rent a home in these regions.
Methodology
The effort rate reflects the proportion of a household's purchasing power spent on housing. Specifically, for rental properties, idealista/data calculates the effort rate as the annual percentage of the average net household income required to pay the rent for a typical two-bedroom home. Rental values are sourced directly from idealista's database, which provides prices for each town and city, while net household income data is derived from the National Institute of Statistics (INE).
Data compiled and analysed by idealista/data, idealista's proptech, which provides information for a professional audience to facilitate strategic decision-making in Spain, Italy and Portugal. It uses all the idealista database parameters in each country and other public and private data sources to offer valuation, investment, recruitment and market analysis services.