Community of owners to approve new Tourist Licences

idealista

29 July 2025, 10:13

Last 3rd of April 2025, Spain’s Horizontal Property Act was amended. This is the law that rules on community of owners in Spain.

In a nutshell, the amendment is that community of owners may now vote to authorise the ban of new tourist licences granted on or after the 3rd of April 2025. This was prompted because before this change, a unanimity vote was required which of course never happened because owners (landlords) who rented out would oppose a ban, leading to a stalemate. This change in law breaks the gridlock and now allows rental blanket bans in community of owners all over Spain.

In effect, this law empowers community of owners to decide on whether they allow, or not, tourism licences. This changes the rules of engagement.

This change in law has far-reaching implications, even financial ones, that significantly affect property prices and sale prospects. In plain English, it marks a new milestone in buying and selling properties in Spain for all the reasons I collate below.

Community vote

It requires a vote of 60% of the owners, who in turn represent 60% of the community.

Ban: if owners decide to ban all tourist licences going forward in a community, this means that even if a property owner attains a valid Tourism Licence from Regional Tourism Authorities after the ban, he is banned from offering his property as a holiday accommodation (short-term let).
Approve: If owners allow new tourism licences, landlords will be free to offer their property as holiday lets jyts like before.

Principle of no retroactivity

The above begs the question of what happens to landlords who offer holiday accommodations and have already attained a tourism licence before the new law came into effect?

The short answer is nothing.

They had already acquired a legal right to rent out their properties as tourist lets, and any community ban that is approved on holiday accommodations does not affect them as they are expressly excluded from its effects. In short, they walk away scott free.

Financial implications of this change in law: short-term rental monopolies

As stated in the article’s introduction, this change will have a huge financial impact on a property’s asking price going forward.

This is because a unit offered as a holiday accommodation on online platforms can easily make a net 7 to 10% yield a year, depending on location. This is in sharp contrast with long-term lets, which barely offer a 4% net yield, and, to top it off, you have a very serious risk of ending up with squatters under new pro-tenant laws. As a result, landlords have swapped en masse their properties from long-term to short-term, which are far more profitable and secure from a legal standpoint (fast evictions on non-payment as not the main place of abode).

Now, with this change in law from the 3rd of April, this means that some properties are outright banned from being rented out as short-term lets in community of owners. This change impacts on the sales price. This is better understood with an example.

Take two luxury penthouses in a community of owners in Marbella. They both have the same size, orientation, and finishings. Both properties are valued at the same price, €1,000,000, as in effect they are identical, both legally and physically.

However, one owner diligently procured a Tourism Licence, and the other did not before the 3rd of April 2025.

Following the 3rd of April change, the community of owners voted a blanket ban on tourist rentals. The first owner now has a property which he can still offer as a holiday accommodation because the ban does not affect him (the principle of no retroactivity on acquired rights), whereas the second penthouse owner is banned from doing so.

Consequently, the first owner can easily achieve a 10% yield a year on his property, whilst the second one cannot. In plain English, the properties are now legally different.

The effect this ban has is that now the first property has a revised valuation of €1,100,000, or more, to reflect the potential rental yield. Whereas the second property’s price has dropped to €900,000, or under because he is now banned from renting out short-term (he may still rent out long-term if he wishes, but the yield as explained above is significantly lower and far riskier).

In effect, this change in law has allowed the first property owner to hold a legal ‘monopoly’ on short-term rentals within a community of owners (as no new tourist lets are allowed), which greatly appreciates his property’s value. Whereas the second property owner, out of no fault of his own, has seen his property’s value take a brutal dip, which translates into a steep price drop.

Property-hunting

Following this law, on being instructed by conveyance clients to buy property in Spain, we are now tasked by them to ensure no rental bans are in place. Which means our law firm is systematically discarding properties – which are perfectly good from a legal point of view – only because they now have a rental ban in place affecting them.

The immediate effect is that properties affected by rental bans are now harder to sell. So, besides experiencing a sharp price drop, they will also take longer to sell. Properties affected by rental bans will be the last ones to be picked by savvy investors, the bottom of the litter, pushing back sales dates by months or years.

In conclusion

The change in law of the 3rd of April 2025 is yet another example of the government’s war against tourist rentals.

As a recap, it has the following consequences:

Prohibition to offer properties as holiday homes in communities of owners that vote to ban them
Asking property prices affected by rental bans will drop sharply, by 10 to 20%
Asking property prices not affected by bans will appreciate sharply, by 10 to 20%
This law creates legal rental ‘monopolies’ in some communities of owners
The law changes the legal status of properties (which impacts their asking price and sale prospects)
Properties affected by rental bans will be shunned by buyers, taking much longer to sell
Properties allowed to be offered as tourist rentals will sell much faster and at a higher price
A two-tier approval system on tourism licences is now working. Even if you are granted a Tourism Licence, your community of owners can shut it down unless you got it before the 03-04-2025 (which is a double control). Conversely, if your community bans them outright, you cannot get a Tourism Licence, even if you meet all the legal requirements

This law is the latest, but not the last, chapter in the Spanish government’s ongoing war against tourist rentals. Only time will tell if these well-meaning changes prove positive or detrimental.

What is clear to me is that the immediate aftermath we are witnessing, brought about by this change in law, are that few property owners are winners and most are losers. They are collateral casualties in the war being waged against tourist rentals throughout Spain.

At LNA, our friendly team can assist you in buying (or selling) your property anywhere in Spain. We can also get you any residence visa in Spain. Give us a call!

At Larrain Nesbitt Abogados (LNA) we have over 22 years of experience specialising in property conveyance and taxation all over Spain. We also assist clients with immigration & residency visas, and inheritance procedures (probate). You can contact us by e-mail at info@larrainnesbitt.com, by telephone on our UK line (+44) 0754 3838 218, or Spanish line (+34) 952 19 22 88, or by completing our contact form.

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