Spain's Tourist Rental Stock Falls 10.7% as Supreme Court Voids National Registry

Spain had 341,001 tourist homes listed on digital platforms in May 2026, 10.7% fewer than a year earlier, according to official experimental statistics. The loss of 40,836 units is the second largest annual fall in the series and brings tourist homes down to 1.28% of the country’s housing stock, well below the all time peak of 403,267 recorded in August 2021. Against November 2025 the count rose 3.4%, or 11,237 units, in line with the usual build ahead of the summer season.

The figures at a glance

Metric	Value
Tourist homes, May 2026	341,001
Year on year change	-10.7% (-40,836 units)
Change vs November 2025	+3.4% (+11,237 units)
Share of national housing stock	1.28%
All time peak, August 2021	403,267
Bed places	1,714,702 (about five per home)

Every region in decline

All of Spain’s autonomous communities posted a year on year fall. Comunidad Valenciana recorded the steepest drop in absolute terms, followed by Cataluña.

Region	Tourist homes, May 2026	Year on year change
Andalucía	90,649	Down
Cataluña	51,305	-5,546 units
Comunidad Valenciana	51,268	-11,922 units
Canarias	48,356	Down
Illes Balears	21,304	Down

Only five provinces grew, all inland and away from the main coastal tourism corridors.

Province	Year on year change
Badajoz	+16%
Cáceres	+14%
Jaén	+7%
Cuenca	+6%
La Rioja	+1%

Where the stock is concentrated

Province	Tourist homes, May 2026
Málaga	45,176
Alicante	32,148
Las Palmas	26,998
Santa Cruz de Tenerife	21,358
Illes Balears	21,304
Girona	20,821

Municipality	Tourist homes, May 2026
Madrid	10,836
Málaga	8,288
Barcelona	8,231
Marbella	6,987
Sevilla	6,937
Valencia	5,393
Mijas	4,465

What is driving the contraction

Spain’s Housing Ministry attributes the fall to recent regulatory measures.

Measure	What it does
Ventanilla Única Digital	A single national digital gateway through which platforms must share data on published listings with the authorities
Reform of the Horizontal Property Law	Lets owners’ communities in shared buildings block new tourist use of a home. It is not retroactive and applies only from its approval onwards

Supreme Court strikes down the national registry

In a judgment dated 19 May 2026, Spain’s Supreme Court partially upheld an appeal by the Generalitat Valenciana against Royal Decree 1312/2024 and annulled the single registration procedure for short-term rentals. The court found that the central government lacked the competence to impose a nationwide registry, since housing and tourism fall to the regions, and that the national registry overlapped with existing regional ones.

Element of the decree	Outcome
Single registration procedure and national registration number	Annulled
Ventanilla Única Digital	Upheld
Platform obligations to transmit listing data, such as listing URLs	Upheld
Data transfers for statistical purposes	Upheld

The ruling leaves regional tourist registries and licences as the reference point for compliance, while platforms remain bound by their data sharing duties.

Why it matters

For operators, falling supply and an unsettled legal framework point to continued fragmentation across Spain’s regional markets. Compliance now hinges on each region’s own registry and licensing rules rather than a single national number, while community vetoes limit new conversions in shared buildings. The licensed stock that remains faces less competition, but expansion plans need to be checked market by market.

Cover photo: Alexandre Perotto on Unsplash.