The Ministry has received more than 421,000 applications over the past year, most of them related to holiday rentals.
Spain’s Ministry of Housing and Urban Agenda has asked several property platforms to remove more than 86,000 listings for tourist and short-term rental properties that do not comply with the legal requirements for this type of accommodation. These removal requests correspond to listings detected since January last year, when the national registry for short-term rentals was launched, according to the ministry led by Isabel Rodríguez.
The listings in question refer to properties that applied for the mandatory registration number but ultimately did not obtain it because they failed to prove they met the requirements needed to obtain the licence.
The single registry for tourist and seasonal rentals came into force on 2 January 2025. From that date, property owners have been required to obtain a registration number through the Digital One-Stop Shop for Rentals before advertising their property on online platforms. However, the obligation to have this number did not become enforceable until 1 July 2025, as a transitional adaptation period was established.
Over the past year, the Ministry has identified 86,275 properties advertised without the corresponding registration number, despite having initiated the process to obtain one.
To receive a registration number, property owners must provide several details about the property, including the cadastral reference, address, unique property registry code, type of rental and expected occupancy. They must also prove they hold the licences required under regional or municipal regulations, such as tourist, habitability or planning licences. Once the registration number is granted, it must appear in all published listings and be updated if any relevant aspect of the property or its rental conditions changes.
In the last twelve months, 412,253 registration applications have been submitted. Most correspond to tourist rentals (320,620 applications, or 78%), while 91,608 (22%) relate to seasonal rentals. According to the Ministry, a large share of rejected applications—and therefore irregular listings—occurred from July onwards. In fact, almost 35,000 holiday apartment applications were rejected between July and August alone, out of roughly 69,000 submitted during that period.
Once the Ministry notifies these irregularities, the platforms where the properties are advertised are required to remove the listings, since the same property may be marketed on several platforms simultaneously.
By region, Andalusia leads the number of rejected applications with 21,872, followed by the Valencian Community (14,387) and the Canary Islands (13,726). In terms of cities, Madrid has the highest number of refusals (5,344), followed by Barcelona (5,005) and Málaga (2,993)—three cities traditionally known for their high concentration of tourist accommodation.
The Ministry argues that the mandatory registry aims to reduce fraud in short-term rentals while helping some of these properties move into the long-term residential rental market. In some cases, properties may be advertised temporarily because they are assigned a provisional registration number before receiving the final one.
In addition, several authorities are monitoring information published on property platforms such as Idealista, Fotocasa and Airbnb. The Ministry of Consumer Affairs has recently launched investigations after detecting listings that may violate housing regulations, for example by offering prices above those allowed in officially declared “stressed housing areas.” According to the ministry, these practices could constitute misleading and unfair consumer practices.
In this context, the government has already imposed sanctions on several companies. Notably, Airbnb was fined €64 million for allowing properties without a licence to be advertised on its platform. This was the second-largest fine ever imposed by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs on a single company, after the €108 million penalty imposed on Ryanair in November 2024 for practices considered abusive, such as charging extra fees for carry-on luggage.
Another company currently under investigation is Alquiler Seguro, which could face a €3.6 million fine for alleged violations of consumer rights.