The State requires platforms to remove 53,876 illegal tourist apartments.

BarcelonaThe Ministry of Housing and Urban Agenda will require online rental platforms, such as Airbnb and others, to remove the listings for 53,876 tourist apartments for not meeting legal requirements. This was announced this Sunday by the President of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sánchez, at a PSOE political event in Malaga. These apartments applied for their mandatory registration number on July 1st, but do not meet the requirements. According to Sánchez, these apartments can therefore be used for rentals to young people and families.

According to the Ministry of Housing, "the different platforms will now have to remove the listings for these properties, which can be marketed on more than one at a time," with the goal of "allowing them to be incorporated into the residential rental market." Spain is the first European country with a single registry for temporary accommodation, which came into effect on January 1st, and since August, the ministry, registrars, and the platforms themselves have shared a digital one-stop shop to put an end to fraud in this type of rental.

By region, Catalonia is the third region where the most tourist accommodation registrations have been revoked, specifically 7,729, according to data from the ministry headed by Isabel Rodríguez. Leading the ranking is Andalusia, with 16,740 cancellations, and the Canary Islands, with 8,698 apartments that do not meet the requirements for tourist use. The Valencian Community is in fourth place, behind Catalonia, with 7,499, followed by Galicia with 2,640, and the Balearic Islands with 2,373. Following the islands is Madrid, with 1,531 revocations.

Within Catalonia, Barcelona is the municipality with the most cancellations, 1,564; it is followed by Lloret de Mar, with 517 apartments that do not meet the requirements, and Salou, with 453. In fact, Barcelona is the municipality in Spain with the third most rejected applications, behind only Seville (2,289) and Marbella (1,802).

According to data from the Ministry, since the registry began operating throughout Spain on January 1, 336,497 applications have been received, of which 264,998 (78.75%) were for tourist accommodation. Of these, 53,786 applications (20.3%) have been revoked, meaning that one in five apartments that attempted to be registered as tourist properties has failed.

Anomaly in Madrid

The ministry highlighted this Sunday the strange case occurring in Madrid. "The great anomaly within the registries is the Community of Madrid, where the percentage is reversed: 83 percent of the apartments that have requested registration have done so as temporary rentals and only 17 percent as tourist rentals." However, of the 3,513 applications for tourist rentals in the community, a third have been revoked for not complying with the law, Isabel Rodríguez's ministry has pointed out.

According to the operation of the registry, an application is rejected when the College of Registrars receives the request and it has incomplete data or data that does not comply with the regulations for tourist rental activities, and these irregularities are not corrected within the established period.

Sánchez attacks the right.

While the right and far right are gaining ground in the polls, Pedro Sánchez wanted his first act of the political year to include more measures for one of the areas the government considers a priority: housing. To counteract the strain caused by the Cerdán case, the trial of the Attorney General, and the hanging governability, the Spanish president focused his speech on boasting about the policies his government has approved so far, also defending having championed the response to the genocide in Gaza, but above all, attacking the spearhead. "When they appear in the media, they say they're hurting for Spain, but they're not hurting for Spain, they're hurting for being in the opposition, which is where they'll be for a while longer," he asserted. Thus, Sánchez has insisted that, as of today, his intention is to complete the term and call elections in 2027.

The Socialists have chosen Andalusia to kick off the political year because it is one of the regions that will be playing their part next year in the regional elections, and with María Jesús Montero. The event was intended to serve as a message of strength to an electorate that, according to most polls, has lost confidence in him. In parallel, this Monday, Sánchez is gathering all the deputies, senators, and MEPs in the party's interparliamentary committee to outline the strategic lines for the political course. On the table are the budget for next year and negotiations with the party's partners. María Jesús Montero, apart from playing her part in Andalusia in 2026, is also the minister responsible for preparing the state accounts.

In fact, one of the partners, Esquerra (Republican Left), has targeted him because it believes he is dragging his feet when it comes to moving forward with fulfilling the specific financing for Catalonia so as not to harm its pre-campaign in Andalusia. Montero did not mention this, but she did defend another of the agreements with Esquerra: the forgiveness of part of the debt of the Regional Financing Fund (FFA). The Minister of Finance attacked the PP for putting obstacles in her way: "This issue doesn't work for them because their deceitful, lying argument falls flat." Montero accused Alberto Núñez Feijóo's party of trying to "set territories against each other," claiming that there is a "grievance" between Catalonia and Andalusia and, in this regard, noted that Andalusia is the region that will have the most debt forgiven. "The Spanish government has an Andalusian accent. The accent is not just about speaking it, but looking out for the interests of Andalusia," she concluded.