VAT on Tourist Apartments in Spain from 1 December 2026: The New 10% Rule Explained
From 1 December 2026 short-stay furnished rentals of 30 nights or less to the same guest become subject to 10% Spanish VAT under RDL 26/2026, even with no hotel services. What changes, who is caught, the habitual-residence exception and what owners of holiday lets must do now, for international landlords.
By Jacob Salama, international tax lawyer (Bar no. 11.294, Málaga)
10/9/20264 min read
By Jacob Salama, international tax lawyer (Bar no. 11.294, Málaga)
VAT on Tourist Apartments in Spain from 1 December 2026: The New 10% Rule Explained
For years the fiscal appeal of a Spanish holiday flat rested on a quiet assumption: rent it out by the night, add no hotel services, and the income sat outside VAT altogether. That assumption stops being true on 1 December 2026. Royal Decree-Law 26/2026 of 29 September (published in the BOE on 30 September 2026) rewrites the Spanish VAT Act so that short-stay furnished rentals become taxable, at a reduced rate of 10%, whether or not you provide a single hotel service.
This is the most important indirect-tax change for holiday-let owners in a decade, and it lands on a very international group: British, Irish, Dutch, German, French and American owners of apartments on the Costa del Sol, the Costa Blanca, the islands and the historic centres of Málaga, Valencia and Seville. Here is what changes, the date it bites, who is caught, and what to do before your first booking of December 2026.
What was the rule until now?
The Spanish VAT Act (Ley 37/1992, or LIVA) has always exempted residential letting. A furnished holiday rental was pulled out of that exemption only when the landlord provided "complementary services proper to the hotel industry": reception, daily cleaning during the stay, laundry, restaurant. Most private owners deliberately stayed on the exempt side of that line — keys and a clean flat, nothing more — precisely so VAT never entered the picture. That structural choice is what the reform dismantles.
What exactly changes on 1 December 2026?
RDL 26/2026 rewrites letter e') of article 20.Uno.23.º LIVA. From 1 December 2026, letting a furnished apartment or dwelling is excluded from the VAT exemption — it becomes taxable — when either:
the landlord provides any of the complementary hotel-industry services (restaurant, cleaning, laundry or the like) — the old criterion; or
the duration for the same tenant does not exceed 30 nights — a brand-new, purely time-based test.
The second bullet is the earthquake. The decisive factor is no longer what services you provide but how long the guest stays. A stay of 30 nights or fewer is now taxable by definition, even with nothing beyond a furnished flat and a set of keys. A parallel change to article 91.Uno.2.2.º LIVA sets the rate at the 10% reduced rate, not the standard 21%.
The one exception: rooms in your own home
Where the short stay takes place in the apartment or dwelling in which the landlord has their habitual residence, it stays exempt. Rent a spare room in the home you actually live in and you are not dragged into VAT. Let a separate holiday flat you do not live in, and the exemption is gone.
From what date, exactly? "Since when"
Article 7 of RDL 26/2026 gives the VAT change its own effective date: 1 December 2026. The rest of the decree-law entered into force on 1 October 2026, but the VAT rule waits until 1 December. A stay falling on or after that date is caught; October and November 2026 stays run under the old regime. The tax point turns on when the stay is supplied, not when it was booked.
Who is caught, and who is not?
Caught (now 10% VAT)
Owners of a dedicated flat let by the night or week for stays of 30 nights or fewer — the typical vivienda de uso turístico (VUT).
Owners who already provided hotel-style services.
Non-resident owners, exactly as residents — the tax attaches to the activity in Spain, not to where you live.
Not caught (still exempt)
Short lets of a room in the landlord's own habitual residence.
Longer single-tenant lets over 30 nights with no hotel services — mid-term and seasonal rentals.
Long-term residential leases to a household — always exempt, and now favoured with income-tax reductions.
What does becoming a VAT taxpayer involve?
Registration via Modelo 036, activating a Spanish tax number for the activity.
Charging 10% VAT to the guest and issuing compliant invoices.
Periodic VAT returns (Modelo 303, usually quarterly) plus the annual Modelo 390.
Input VAT recovery — the upside: you can deduct VAT on cleaning, agency fees, repairs, furniture and supplies used for the taxable let.
It is not only VAT: the wider squeeze
RDL 26/2026 is a coordinated package. Two other measures change the overall maths:
IBI surcharge. Municipalities in a "stressed residential market area" may add up to 50% to the property tax on tourist-use homes, rising to 100% for owners of two or more and 150% for owners of four or more.
Loss of income-tax reductions. The generous rental-income reductions are reserved for long-term residential leases; tourist letting is left out.
What should owners do before 1 December 2026?
Confirm your category — dedicated nightly flat (caught) vs room-in-your-home or longer single-tenant let (potentially not).
Register in time so your Modelo 036 is effective for December stays.
Fix pricing and platform settings so invoices show the 10% correctly from day one.
Start capturing input VAT — keep every supplier invoice.
Check your municipality for an IBI tourist surcharge.
Understand your exact position — and run the numbers
We help international owners get registered, priced and invoiced correctly before the season:
Talk to us before your first December booking, not after.
WhatsApp: https://wa.me/34644121802
Book a call: Calendly
Email: taxlegalspain@gmail.com