How to rent your property in Spain: All you need to know
If you have a property in Spain, for vacation or investment, that you do not use continuously and you want to make the most of it without complications, without a doubt, the seasonal rental is the best option available to you if you are not willing to make a long-term rental, as is usually the case, but it entails a series of disadvantages that not all landlords are willing to expose themselves to.
Landlords in Spain, often find it difficult to rent their property because the current legal framework generates many uncertainties regarding the security of payments and the integrity of the property on the part of the tenants, who can cause damage to the property, as well as defaulting on the rental payment, which can leave the landlord of the property in a situation of defenselessness.
As a landlord, you may have some doubts about the types of rentals that exist and how they work or what legal aspects you should take into account to be able to rent your property in compliance with the law and with the maximum guarantees, something completely normal if you are offering your property for the first time.
Don’t worry, in this article, we will tell you everything you need to know about the process, the requirements, and the most important points to bear in mind if you want to get the most out of your property in Spain with a temporary rental.
Table of Contents
How to rent my property in Spain
The first and most important thing is to define the type of rental you want to offer for your home or property, as this will provide you with a good basis for understanding the type of tenant the service is aimed at.
One of the most popular types of rentals at the moment are temporary rentals (but not holiday rentals, as is usually the case), mainly for workers or business travelers, so the tenant profile is professional and short-term.
This provides great peace of mind to owners who decide to opt for this type of rental, as the risk of non-payment is reduced to a minimum, and the low probability of suffering damage to the property is also an important point, given the short duration of the same.
The process to put your property for rent is very simple, just contact us and we will take care of the first steps to put your property on our platform. We will collect the essential information so that tenants and companies can assess whether the property meets the minimum requirements to be included in our listings and so that companies and workers start to take an interest in it.
You will not have to worry about having to receive visits, we will take care of taking the necessary photographs so that potential companies and tenants can see, through them, if the property meets their needs. In this way, you will have total peace of mind as you will not have to show the property or hand over the keys to receive strangers.
As a landlord, it is one of the most convenient ways to offer your property for rent without worry and you will be able to make a constant profit with minimum risk and without compromising the use of the property for long periods.
Rental options
As we have already mentioned, short and medium-term rentals are the ideal options for landlords who want to make a profit by offering housing for geographically displaced workers or professionals who are constantly moving from one place to another.
However, we are going to talk a little about the different rental options that currently exist, so that you can assess the advantages of temporary rental for workers and companies.
Renting of permanent and habitual residence
This is the most widespread rental option and the one that most people refer to when talking about rentals.
In this option, the duration of the contracts, although it can be agreed by both parties, if it is less than 5 years, once the term has expired, it can be extended up to 5 years on an annual basis if the tenant so wishes.
These are long-term contracts, in which the tenant will spend long periods enjoying the property, and, although it may seem otherwise, they are the ones that can cause the most problems for landlords.
Non-payments, damages, breach of contract… these are usually points that occur frequently in long-term contracts and, due to current regulations, are difficult to resolve in short periods, leaving the property blocked until the conflict is resolved.
They also offer less flexibility, given that at the moment the contract is signed, any change to the contract must be duly justified, meaning that the property would be immobilized if your short-term plans change.
Holiday rentals
Another of the most widespread modalities, especially in locations that are usually popular holiday destinations.
This contract option is mainly focused on very short stays, which can be days or weeks, as it is an alternative option to using accommodation such as hotels.
Although this type of rental offers a lot of flexibility given that they are very short term, they have the disadvantage of being really valid options for those owners who have a property in an attractive destination for tourism and you may be exposed to undesirable tenants.
Monthly or seasonal rentals
In our opinion, the best option of all, although, surprisingly enough, it is one of the least widespread at present.
This type of rental brings together all the advantages and flexibility of holiday rentals with the security of being a much longer contract without reaching the level of renting a regular home, so you will have a stable source of income but one that will not leave the property immobilised for long periods of time.
With the arrival of the pandemic and the normalisation of teleworking, renting for months or seasons is an option that is becoming more and more fashionable, as professionals and companies all over the world are opting for relocation, giving their workers a lot of freedom to develop their activity anywhere in the world, which is why the demand for this type of temporary housing is increasingly in demand.
Requirements for renting
To be able to rent your property, it must meet a series of minimum requirements to make the tenants’ stay viable for the stipulated period.
Don’t worry, these are not unattainable requirements, they are established to guarantee both the correct stay of the tenant, as well as to provide security to you as the owner so that the process runs smoothly and without mishaps.
The requirements that the property must meet are as follows:
- It must be ready to move into
- It must have all the necessary permits (certificate of occupancy, supplies, etc…).
- It must have the minimum equipment:
- Television
- Washing machine
- Fridge
- Basic kitchenware
- Bed linen and towels
- Internet access and WiFi
As you can see, these requirements are perfectly acceptable and are usually requested in any rental contract for a regular home, so if you were already thinking of renting it out in a traditional rental, there will be no impediment whatsoever to renting it temporarily.
Apart from these requirements that the property itself must meet, during the process, other documents and data necessary to formalize the contract will be requested, such as the certificate of occupancy of the property, cadastral data, or energy efficiency certificates, but these documents are very easy to obtain and most landlords already have them in their possession.
Legal aspects of renting in Spain
The legal aspects of property rental in Spain are governed by the Ley de Arrendamientos Urbanos (LAU), which in Article 3 specifies:
“Shall be considered (leases other than for residential use) the leases of urban properties entered into on a seasonal basis, whether in summer or any other season.”
Therefore, this specific point of the LAU is the one that dictates the guidelines that we must take into account at a legal level for this type of contract. They should not be confused with tourist or holiday rentals, as the amendment of 4 June 2013 introduced into the LAU the flexibilization of this type of contract, differentiating them as follows:
“The following are excluded from the scope of application:
The temporary transfer of use of the entirety of a furnished and equipped dwelling in conditions of immediate use, marketed or promoted in tourist offer channels and carried out for profit when it is subject to a specific regime, derived from its sectorial regulations”.
At a legal level, seasonal contracts are mainly governed by what the owner and the tenant stipulate in the contract. With Globexs’ advice, you will not have to worry at all about this point, as we will advise you at all times.
The law stipulates that the legal deposit that must be paid by the tenant is two months, which is a fact that many tenants and landlords are completely unaware of, as contracts for regular housing are governed by a different criterion, whereby only one month’s deposit is required.
This deposit is intended to cover possible damages and incidents caused by misuse by the tenant and is intended to pay for possible repairs to be carried out after the end of the contract.
Although it may seem a complicated law, in reality, it is a fairly simple process in which there should be no complications beyond complying with the deadlines and payments established by the current legal framework, however, it is always important to have the help of professionals in the field.
Recommendations when renting a property
As you can see, the option of renting your property on a seasonal basis is very attractive and allows you to maintain control and flexibility over the use to which it will be put at all times, allowing you to obtain a significant financial return without having to tie it up for long periods.
In addition, the tenant profile provides security to landlords that cannot be achieved with other types of rental contracts, as the short duration of the contracts and the high-value profile of the tenant make it very unlikely that you will encounter a situation of non-payment or damage.
However, you will always be in control of who your property is rented to, as even if a person or company is interested in renting, you can, at any time, reject the offer if you do not consider it appropriate or viable, so you can make decisions at any time.
One of the ways to give more visibility to your property is to publish it on different rental portals, as this will increase the range of possibilities of finding tenants with this profile, although you should check very carefully if there are any exclusivity clauses or associated costs that are not reflected.
As you can see, there are many options to make your property profitable with different modalities and types of contracts. It is up to you to decide what type of tenant profile you are looking for and to assess in the short and medium term whether you will need the property for other purposes or whether you can opt for a long-term rental.
We recommend that you try the system that Globexs puts at your disposal, and visit our website so that you can see firsthand the quality of our offer and, above all, the positive opinions that all our clients leave on the net, this being the best guarantee to guarantee you a first class service.
We hope that you will soon be able to benefit from all the advantages that seasonal rental offers you and that you will place your trust in us, we are convinced that this will be the beginning of a long and prosperous relationship.
