Regulations on tourist apartments in Catalonia 2022

If you have an empty apartment and you're thinking it's time to make it profitable, you'll be interested to know what the regulations on tourist apartments in Catalonia say. In addition, since the legislation depends on the City Council, below you'll find the ordinance on tourist apartments in Barcelona and how you can get your license in 2022.

Complying with the law is essential if you want to rent your property consciously and save some money on sanctions that you will not receive.

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Regulations on tourist rentals in Catalonia

The legislation that you have to read more carefully than the shampoo bottle when you go to the bathroom and you have left your mobile phone is the Decree 159/2012 (here you can consult it in PDF). It is applicable whether you rent it out yourself or you give the exploitation of your property to an agency and you dedicate yourself to receiving the benefits.

What are the requirements that tourist apartments in Catalonia must meet?

• You must rent your property at least twice a year.
• The rental period must never exceed 31 consecutive days for the same tenant.
• The dwelling must have a habitability certificate.
• It must not have more tenants than those established by the habitability certificate.
• It must have sufficient furniture and household goods to function as accommodation and, of course, it must be in good hygienic conditions.

Now comes the interesting point of the tourist apartments regulations in Catalonia: how to obtain your license. 

How to obtain a tourist rental license in Catalonia

If you meet the above requirements, you're in luck, you have everything you need to apply for the legalization of your tourist rental in Catalonia.

According to the regulations on tourist apartments in Catalonia, you must submit to the City Council of the municipality where the property is located a notification informing that you are going to start renting your apartment as a tourist house.

The City Council will notify the Catalonia Tourism Registry (RTC for friends), which is responsible for verifying that the property meets all the requirements and granting you the license to carry out this activity in a completely legal manner.

In addition to obtaining the tourist rental license, in Catalonia, there are strict limits on the noise that your guests can make - in reality, the same as any other neighbor.

In our information center on tourist housing legislation you can find more details on regulations in other cities.

What is the tourist rental license in Catalonia for?

First of all, to avoid sanctions, which is not little. In addition, once you obtain your license number, you can include it in your advertisements, which gives security to those interested in renting the apartment.

On the other hand, once the RTC has given your property the green light, it includes you in the tourist establishments website and on the Catalonia website.

As you have seen, obtaining the license is not complicated at all. If you have worked on your property to be in optimal conditions to receive tenants, there is no reason why the RTC should not grant you the license.

It is a simple procedure that you can also do very quickly, so we recommend that you don't risk it and save yourself trouble. Process your license and enjoy the peace of mind of renting your vacation home in full compliance with the law.

Regulations for tourist apartments in Barcelona: everything you need to know

Every master has his own little book and each Autonomous Community has its own peculiarities regarding regulations on tourist rental, and Catalonia is no exception.

In addition to all the requirements we have seen, it is necessary that your tourist use dwelling is registered in the Tourism Registry of Catalonia. But in this case, you can forget about carrying papers from one side to another so that when you are finally attended to, they inform you that you are missing some form. All that is a thing of the past, since 2017 all these procedures are now done exclusively online.

The good thing is that, for once, you won't have to pay fees. So no more laziness and register as soon as possible to legalize your tourist accommodation. What's more, in many cases it is the Town Hall itself that officially communicates the granting of the license to the Registry, so that the Catalonia Tourism Registry proceeds directly to registration and informs the interested party of the registration number (NIRC).

The NIRC must appear in all advertisements in which the property is marketed. It is a way of providing security to both customers and other individuals and companies that also own tourist accommodations.

PEUAT and the division by zones

PEUAT (Special Urban Plan for Tourist Accommodations) may sound like Chinese to you, but if you're going to get into this business, you should know that it's a basic regulation on tourist apartments in Barcelona. You can find all the information about PEUAT on the municipal website.

It has been in force since 2017 and its objective is to regulate tourist activity, so that coexistence between neighbors, tourists and owners of tourist properties is as peaceful as possible.

But the truth is that this rule is not very popular with those who have tourist accommodations, as it has installed the phenomenon known as "zero growth". To do this, it has divided the city into four zones and regulated the concentration of tourist establishments.

Zone 1 is the one with the highest volume of tourist dwellings (it exceeds 5,000). The Barcelona City Council has understood that this number is excessive, so it is committed to decreasing it. How? By not granting more licenses to vacation homes in this area or expanding the places that have already been registered.

As you can imagine, this affects some of the most touristic neighborhoods, such as Hostafrancs, Eixample, Ciutat Vella, Vila Olímpica and Rambla among others.

Zone 2 is known as the maintenance zone. Here the purpose is to maintain the number of places that exist now, so if an apartment with 5 accommodation places is deregistered, a license will be granted to another dwelling under similar conditions.

The affected neighborhoods are Les Corts, Sants, Diagonal, Fort Pienc, and Baix Guinardó, among others.

In Zone 3, the conditions are a bit more special. You can register a accommodation if there's a cancellation in the same zone, in Zone 1 (except Ciutat Vella) or even in Zone 2, without exceeding 387 dwellings in any case.

This affects regions such as La Verneda, Nou Barris, Sarrià, and part of Les Corts, as well as Vallcarca, Horta, La Sagrera, and El Guinardó.

The Zone 4 is made up of the neighborhoods of La Marina del Prat Vermell, La Sagrera and 22 Nord, here the creation of new tourist dwellings is absolutely prohibited.

And to all this we have to add the Specific Treatment Areas (ATE), which are those that have some special features. They are basically the historical cases of Sants, Les Corts, Horta and Sant Andreu among others. Here, the rules of Zones 1 and 2 are applied according to the case.

How to apply for registration?

If you want to obtain the license that allows you to carry out tourist rental activity legally, you need to have a favorable report from PEUAT. You can make the application online or in person, requesting an appointment at the Barcelona City Council.

When making the application, you must prove that:

• The property meets all the requirements established in the urban planning regulations.
• The house is not occupied.
• It has a certificate of habitability.
• It is located in an area where the PEUAT allows the creation of new tourist dwellings
• The house does not occupy the ground floor of a building.
• It has not been used as a dwelling since June 1, 2015.
• The building has a license to be used as a tourist dwelling and other compatible uses.

Documentation to include

When you finally check that you meet all the requirements and you will be able to continue with your project, it's time to prepare the documentation. This is essential, you know how friendly the Public Administration is with bureaucracy and paperwork, if you are missing something you will have to come back another day, so check carefully that you have everything.

The documents you need are the following:

• The license application duly completed and signed. Read the instructions carefully to avoid any errors.
• Photocopy of the applicant's ID, NIE, or passport.
• If it is a legal person acting through a representative, a copy of the power of representation must also be submitted.
• Guarantee of compliance with the First Additional Provision of the PEUAT if the property is in Ciutat Vella or sections 1 to 4 in the rest of the districts. That is, you have ensured that there can be a new tourist accommodation in your area.
• If it is a building, it also presents the authorization for modification of use or activity to be able to dedicate all dwellings to tourist housing activity or compatible uses.
• Number of urban planning license of the building as a tourist use dwelling.
• Simple note from the Property Registry that certifies the registration of the License that shows that the building can operate as a VUT.

And that's it! You finally have everything ready, you comply with the Airbnb apartment ordinance in Barcelona and you can start receiving guests.