Renting long-term on the Spanish coast: what the law says and what tenants pay

A long-term let on the Spanish coast is a home lease under Law 29/1994. If the contract names less than five years, the law extends it year by year up to five, or up to seven if the landlord is a company or other legal entity. What it costs: of 127 coastal places in our base, the middle one had a median rent of €538 a month in 2024 tax records.

Two leases in the law: a home and a season

Spain's urban tenancy law draws a line between two kinds of lease, and nearly everything else follows from it. Below is what the text says, with article numbers. It is a summary of the law, not an opinion on anyone's case.

• A home lease is one whose main purpose is the tenant's permanent need for a home. Article 2.
• A lease «for a season», summer or any other, falls under leases «for a use other than a home». The article names no number of months: a seasonal lease is defined by its purpose, not its length. Article 3.2.
• Titles I and IV of the law apply to every lease. Beyond them, such a lease is governed by what the parties agree, then by Title III of the law and the Civil Code. Article 4.
• The parties choose the term of a home lease. If it is under five years (seven if the landlord is a legal entity), on expiry it is renewed by law for a year at a time until it reaches five or seven. It is not renewed if the tenant gives 30 days' notice of not wanting it. Article 9.1.
• An exception in the same article concerns a landlord who is a private person. If the contract states expressly that the home will be needed for them, their parents or their children, there is no compulsory renewal after the first year. The same applies to a spouse after a final ruling on separation, divorce or annulment. The landlord must give at least two months' notice. Article 9.3.
• After five or seven years the lease rolls over by a year at a time for up to three more years. That happens if neither side has given notice: the landlord four months ahead, the tenant two. Article 10.1.
• A cash deposit (fianza) is compulsory: one month's rent for a home lease, two for a lease for another use, which includes a seasonal one. For a home lease of up to five (or seven) years, any extra guarantee on top of the deposit cannot exceed two months' rent. Article 36.

The consolidated text of the law on BOE was checked on 26.09.2026. Its latest change was published on 25.05.2023.

Where our rent figures come from

The Ministry of Housing publishes SERPAVI: rents under leases taken from tax returns. Under its method, the sample covers homes that private owners let as the tenant's main home and declare for income tax; lets to relatives are left out. A seasonal let does not fit that definition. The latest year is 2024. SERPAVI method.

The sample includes long-standing leases whose rent has not moved in years. So the median answers «what do people already renting pay», not «what will be asked today». The top quarter of tenancies pays more than the 75th percentile, shown beside it in the table.

What tenants pay, coast by coast

A coast's figure is the median of its places. Flats differ in size from coast to coast, so the list runs by rent per square metre, cheapest first. The lowest: Costa da Morte at €3.7/m² a month. The highest: «Ibiza and Formentera» at €12.9/m², 3.5 times as much. For the whole flat the range is €310 to €900.

Tax records for 2024, median of the coast's places. «Top quarter from» is the median 75th percentile. Orihuela Costa is left out: it is a district inside another municipality, and the record covers the whole municipality.

Size differs too. The smallest rented flats, by median: Fuerteventura, 61 m². The largest: Costa da Morte, 92 m². That is why monthly rent and rent per square metre put the coasts in a different order.

Places at both ends

Only places where at least 300 tenancies stand behind the median: 115 of 127. For the others the figure stands on few flats; the fewest are Fisterra with 50 and Camariñas with 51.

Top: the 6 cheapest by monthly median; bottom: the 7 dearest. Every place is in the dataset. What the people already renting pay

Two figures on a place page

A place page with a registry record shows rent twice. The first figure is the registry above: a measurement for 2024. The second is our estimate of what a two-bedroom flat is advertised for today. It is not a measurement, carries no year and no state source, so it stays out of every list in this article.

The gap between them is wide. At the median, our asking estimate is 1.7 times the registry median. Inside the registry the gap is smaller: in the typical place the 75th percentile sits 22% above the median.

Where the housing goes

Three state figures on the housing stock, with January beside them. Not a main home: second, seasonal and empty homes, from the 2021 census. Tourist flats: their share of all housing, INE's count dated 30 April 2026. Tenancies per 100 homes: homes let as a main home in the 2024 tax sample for every hundred homes in the census. January: businesses operating against the busiest month, 2025.

Median of the coast's places, in order along the shore. The figures sit side by side; the table does not say that one causes another. 2021 census · tourist flats

• More than half of all homes are not a main home on 4 coasts: Costa Blanca at 58.5%, Costa Cálida at 56.8%, Costa Tropical at 56.4% and Costa del Azahar at 53.4%.
• Most tourist flats: Lanzarote at 15.2%, Mallorca at 11.5% and Fuerteventura at 11.5%. Fewest: Campo de Gibraltar at 0.3%, Rías Altas at 0.5% and Costa Verde at 0.8%.
• Most tenancies per hundred homes: Costa Barcelona at 15.8, Rías Baixas at 12.8 and Costa Brava at 11.6. Fewest: Costa de la Luz at 2.6, Campo de Gibraltar at 3.2 and Lanzarote at 3.5.

The SERPAVI sample counts only private owners who declare the income. Flats let by companies and undeclared leases are not in it, so «tenancies per 100 homes» is a floor, not the share of the whole rental market.

Three months and short stays

The law has no separate «three-month lease». It has a lease for a season, summer or any other (article 3.2). Article 9, with its five years, sits in Title II, «On home leases». Beyond the common Titles I and IV, a seasonal lease is governed by what the parties agree and by Title III, «On leases for a use other than a home» (article 4.3). Its deposit is two months' rent (article 36.1).

Our base has no prices for such leases: the SERPAVI registry does not collect them, and we have no field for seasonal rent of our own. The only figure here about short-stay housing is the share of tourist flats in the table above. We will not write about seasonal prices without a measurement.

Further

Rent under live tenancies for every place, with a file to download, is in the rent dataset. Homes that are not a main home, and empty ones, place by place, are in the empty homes dataset. January for every place is in the winter openness dataset. What a whole month costs, rent included, is in our cost of living article.

How much of a wage rent takes on each coast is in our piece on Spain's minimum wage and average salary. Rent next to income and winter on two islands is in our comparison of Mallorca and Menorca.

Sources: Law 29/1994 on BOE · SERPAVI · INE.

Term: nóminanóminaA Spanish employment contract with payslips. Landlords ask for it as proof of income.Why it matters. A newcomer does not have one and will not in the first year. Where it is required, a long lease is nearly impossible — even with money in the bank.

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