Buying to let in Spain: what the tourism register can and cannot tell you

"It has a licence." British buyers hear the sentence in Mallorca, on the Costa del Sol and in Tenerife, usually from the seller or the agent, rarely with a document attached. The regional tourism laws use other words. They speak of a declaration (declaración responsable), of an enabling title (título habilitante) and of an entry in a tourism register. The property itself is a vivienda de uso turístico. Knowing these terms lets you ask for the right paper.

The register is the one part of this you can look at yourself. What it shows, and what it leaves open, decides how much the seller's sentence is worth.

Who keeps the register for a holiday let?

The region does. Art. 148.1.18ª of the Spanish Constitution allows the autonomous communities to take on the promotion and regulation of tourism in their territory (consolidated version, last updated 20 May 2026). Each region has used that power with its own tourism law, its own regulations and its own register.

National tenancy law points the same way. The Urban Leases Act, Ley de Arrendamientos Urbanos (Ley 29/1994, LAU), excludes from its scope in Art. 5 e) the temporary letting of a whole furnished flat, ready for immediate use, offered through tourist channels for profit, when a specific regime under tourism law applies to it. That wording dates from Real Decreto-ley 7/2019, in force since 6 March 2019.

So the rules on letting to holidaymakers sit in the tourism law of the region where the property lies. Palma and Málaga answer to different texts.

How does a property get into the register?

By a declaration first. In each of the five regional laws below, the owner or operator tells the administration that the activity will begin, and the entry follows.

In the Balearic Islands, Art. 23 Ley 8/2012 requires a declaration of the start of tourist activity (declaración responsable de inicio de actividad turística, DRIAT) before the activity begins. Submitted with the required documents, it entitles the holder to carry on the activity from the day of submission, unless a specific prior authorisation is required. The same article says that submission has the immediate effect of entry in the register of the island concerned.

In the Canary Islands, Art. 7 Ley 6/2025 (in force since 13 December 2025) has the declaration filed with the island council (Cabildo), which enters the activity of its own motion in the Registro General Turístico. Under Art. 8, submission with all required documents allows the activity to begin from that day, and the entry carries a registration number that must appear in every publication or advertisement, digital platforms included.

In Andalusia, Art. 38.2 Ley 13/2011 says the entry in the Registro de Turismo de Andalucía is made of the authority's own motion after a declaration. Filing the declaration is enough for the duty to register to count as met. Since 4 March 2025, the revised Art. 9 Decreto 28/2016 adds that the flat may be advertised as a vivienda de uso turístico from the moment the electronic declaration is filed.

In the Valencian Community, Art. 53 Ley 15/2018 has the competent body enter the business in the Registro de Turismo de la Comunitat Valenciana of its own motion after the notice or declaration. Art. 19.1 b) requires the exact location and the registration number in all advertising.

Catalonia uses a different term. Under Art. 50 bis Ley 13/2002, a holiday flat needs the enabling title required by the rules in force before the activity begins, and Art. 73.5 requires the number of the entry in the Registro de Turismo de Cataluña in every kind of advertising. The procedure for the entry itself sits in a separate Catalan decree published in the regional gazette (DOGC), which is not consolidated in the BOE.

1. 1Declarationbefore the activity beginsFiled with the regional or island authority (DRIAT in the Balearic Islands, Cabildo in the Canary Islands)
2. 2Start of the activityfrom the day of submissionBalearic Islands Art. 23 Ley 8/2012, Canary Islands Art. 8 Ley 6/2025, Andalusia Art. 38.2 Ley 13/2011
3. 3Entry in the registerafter the declarationImmediate in the Balearic Islands; of the authority's own motion in the Canary Islands, Andalusia and Valencia
4. 4Number in advertisingonce assignedCanary Islands, Catalonia and Valencia; in the Balearic Islands the receipt number of the declaration may stand in until then

The order matters when you read a listing. A number in an advertisement, a declaration on file and an entry in a published register can exist at different times. They are not the same thing.

Which regions publish their register?

Several regions publish their tourism register as open data, and for two of them the law itself says so. Art. 77 Ley 15/2018 states that the Valencian register is public. In Andalusia, the revised Art. 9 Decreto 28/2016 makes the data from the declaration accessible through the open search services of the tourism department, except telephone number and email address.

Six published registers feed into the Claronda check. Their size on 29 September 2026:

• Catalonia108799Registro de Turismo de Cataluña
• Valencian Community90046Registro de Turismo de la Comunitat Valenciana
• Canary Islands72235Registro General Turístico
• Andalusia26518Registro de Turismo de Andalucía
• Mallorca16924island register
• Menorca5379island register

These figures count entries, not flats that are actually let.

Elsewhere there may be nothing to search. Of 435 properties checked against the registers (29 September 2026), 89 lay in a region for which no register is connected to the check. For those, the regional tourism authority is the only source.

What does an entry in the register prove?

That a declaration was filed and recorded for that address or unit.

The Canary Islands law states the limit outright. Under Art. 8 Ley 6/2025, the entry in the Registro General Turístico does not prejudge whether the conditions for the activity are actually met. The other four laws contain no such sentence, and none of them describes the entry as a confirmation either.

Is the entry still in force?

It depends on the region. And on the date. Three of the laws set a period:

• Valencian Community: an entry for a holiday flat is valid for 5 years, subject to the exceptions in the law and its regulations (Art. 65.4 Ley 15/2018).
• Canary Islands: the declaration entitles the holder for 5 years from submission, and for 10 years on El Hierro, La Gomera and La Palma and in municipalities classed as facing demographic challenge (reto demográfico) (Art. 10.1 Ley 6/2025).
• Balearic Islands: for flats in a building divided into units, the declaration entitles the holder for the period set by regulation, by default 5 years from submission (Art. 50.3 Ley 8/2012).

For Andalusia, neither Art. 38 Ley 13/2011 nor the revised Art. 9 Decreto 28/2016 sets a time limit on the entry. The Catalan tourism law itself contains none either.

Does the entry pass to the buyer?

There is no general rule. Two regional texts address it expressly.

In the Valencian Community, the transfer of ownership of the business (transmisión de la titularidad) is entered in the Registro de Turismo (Art. 78.2 Ley 15/2018). In the Canary Islands, flats already let before the new law could rely on a transitional rule for consolidated tourist use (uso turístico consolidado). Under the first transitional provision of Ley 6/2025, its effect ends, among other cases, when ownership of the flat is transferred by any title.

The Balearic, Andalusian and Catalan tourism laws, as consolidated in the BOE, contain no express rule on transfer to a buyer. What applies to a particular flat after a sale is a question for the regional authority.

Why is "not found" not a verdict?

Because one empty result can have several causes.

The laws themselves create some of them. In the Balearic Islands, until the tourist registration number is assigned, advertising may show the receipt number of the filed declaration instead (Art. 23 Ley 8/2012). That receipt number is not a register entry. In Andalusia, filing the declaration counts as meeting the duty to register (Art. 38.2 Ley 13/2011), so a declaration can exist before the entry shows up in published data.

Then there is the region: outside the six published registers there is nothing to search, which was the case for 89 of the 435 properties checked. And the file has a date, because a published register is a copy taken on one day.

The check results show how often the answer is empty or indirect. Of 435 properties checked (29 September 2026), 292 had no entry at all. 54 had an entry in the same building or in the unit. Only 2 of those were matched to the exact unit; the other 52 were in the same building.

Look twice at the 52. An entry in the building says nothing about your flat; it shows that at least one other owner in the same building filed a declaration. For the owners' community, though, a neighbour with an entry can be a reason to read the minutes for resolutions on tourist letting.

What happened to the national registration number?

A seller may also point to a national number. Real Decreto 1312/2024 had set up a national register, the Registro Único de Arrendamientos, to apply EU Regulation 2024/1028 on data about short-term rentals. It entered into force on 2 January 2025, with effect from 1 July 2025, and landlords offering through a platform were to obtain a registration number through the land registry (Registro de la Propiedad).

That core is gone. By judgment of 19 May 2026, published in the BOE on 8 June 2026, the Tribunal Supremo annulled the provisions on the procedure of the Registro Único and on the obligation to register in the Registro de la Propiedad to obtain a number. In the consolidated version of 18 July 2026, Art. 5 (duties of landlords) and Art. 8 (the Registro Único) appear as annulled, with reference to three judgments of May and June 2026. Art. 6, on platform duties, is annulled only insofar as it concerns that procedure and the number.

The Ventanilla Única Digital de Arrendamientos remains in the text (Art. 7), as a single national digital gateway for data between platforms and the authorities, but the Real Decreto does not say what replaces the national number for landlords. A national number is therefore not a feature against which a flat can be checked today. The judgment does not touch the regional registers.

Which questions do you put to the seller, the community and the authority?

Start with the seller. Ask for the registration number, the date the declaration was filed, the region or island it was filed with, and a copy of the declaration and of any acknowledgement. With the number, you can run the registration number check yourself before the next conversation.

Then the owners' community. For flats in a building divided into units (propiedad horizontal), a national rule has applied since 3 April 2025. Under Art. 7.3 of the Horizontal Property Act (Ley de Propiedad Horizontal, LPH), as inserted by Ley Orgánica 1/2025, an owner who wants to begin tourist letting within the meaning of Art. 5 e) LAU needs the express prior approval of the community, on the terms of Art. 17.12 LPH. That paragraph requires three fifths of all owners, who must also represent three fifths of the participation shares, for a resolution that approves, limits, conditions or prohibits tourist letting. Such resolutions have no retroactive effect. An additional provision of the LPH lets an owner who already carried on the activity before Ley Orgánica 1/2025 came into force, and had submitted to tourism law, continue on the terms set there. It is tied to that owner and says nothing about a buyer.

Two regions tie the declaration to the community's documents. In the Canary Islands, a declaration for such a flat must come with a certificate from the owners' meeting that these documents do not exclude a use other than permanent residence (Art. 7 Ley 6/2025). In Andalusia, the declaration must state that the community has expressly authorised it under national law (Art. 9 Decreto 28/2016).

Next, the regional tourism authority that keeps the register: the island administration in the Balearic Islands, the Cabildo in the Canary Islands, the tourism department (Consejería) in Andalusia. Ask whether a declaration is entered for the flat, since when, for what period, and what the region provides for a change of owner.

Last, the town hall. In the Balearic Islands, new declarations for flats may only be filed for flats in zones expressly declared suitable (Art. 50 Ley 8/2012). Which zones those are is a question for the municipality and the island.

A property report includes the register match for one specific property, together with cadastre, location and other official sources.

In short

• The rules for holiday lets sit in regional tourism law (Art. 148.1.18ª of the Constitution).
• Declaration first, entry second. In the Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands and Andalusia the law links the start of the activity to the declaration.
• An entry shows a filed declaration. Valencia sets 5 years of validity, the Canary Islands 5 or 10, the Balearic Islands 5 by default for flats in divided buildings.
• "Not found" has several causes. Of 435 properties checked, 2 had an entry for the exact unit and 52 one in the same building.
• The national number under Real Decreto 1312/2024 was annulled by the Tribunal Supremo on 19 May 2026.
• Ask the seller, the community, the regional authority and the town hall, in writing, before you sign.