PROPERTY SEARCH
What does the scrapping of the National Rental Registration Number mean for owners or potential buyers of property in Spain?
By Alex Radford, Founding Partner, My Lawyer in Spain
Since late 2024, owners of properties in Spain who have wished to rent them out short term have had another legal hoop to jump through. To comply with Royal Decree 1312/2024, they were required to register their properties on a national register and obtain an NRA number from the Land Registry in order to offer them as holiday lets.
This caused a lot of legal headaches, and duplicated the prior registrations which had been required by the regional governments, and created a controversial double registration framework. As of May 19th 2026, this was struck down by the Spanish Supreme Court, which made this state-level registration requirement null and void.
But what does this mean for anyone who owns or is interested in owning a Spanish property and renting them out?
What changes and what stays in force?
It is vital to understand that the Supreme Court did not strike down the Royal Decree in its entirety, but rather partially. However, this partial annulment directly hits the administrative core that most worried the owners and potential buyers.
The National Registration Number or Rental Registration Number (NRA) is annulled: Landlords no longer need to go through the national bureaucratic process with the Land Registry to obtain an identification number to market their properties on online platforms. This eliminates administrative duplications that forced owners, who were already strictly complying with regional laws, to apply for a new, centralized state authorization.
If you were blocked from advertising a property on an online portal because you didn’t have an NRA number, this should be reinstated, so contact the platform in question to ensure that happens, and ask whether you need to resubmit the listing.
But the Digital Single Window remains. The technological infrastructure designed to collect and transfer data from booking platforms to the Administration moves forward under the management of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Agenda. However, instead of drawing from a brand-new state-owned registry, it will connect and interoperate directly with the existing tourism registries of each Autonomous Community.
This is good news for owners of Spanish properties, or buyers who are looking to generate rental income from their property, but it does not mean that the market is unregulated, or that registering your property isn’t required.
What do you need to do if you want to rent your property short term now?
The key change is that the control for holiday rentals returns to the Autonomous Community where your property is located. There are well-established, and well-enforced tourism laws which govern this sector, which are being tightened up in some areas, and you need to ensure that you comply with these laws to rent your property out legally.
If you don’t have a regional tourist license, you must get one, and display it on any advertising. You must comply with your local Town Hall rules, and check that there are no rental restrictions in place for the granting of new tourist licences. Your community of owners is also required to vote to allow or ban tourist lets. This means that any property search driven by rental income must include the information on whether a community allows short term rentals or not.
Once you have the licence and are welcoming guests, they must be logged with the police and rental income must be declared correctly.
My Lawyer in Spain welcomes the scrapping of the NRA and are here to help owners to legally rent out their properties and support them with all aspects of legal and tax compliance.
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Calle Juan Ramon Jimenez 10, Edificio Marbeland 4B, 29601 Marbella (Malaga)My Lawyer in Spain helps English speakers navigate Spanish legal matters with confidence
Sorting out your legal affairs in a different country can feel daunting, especially when Spanish bureaucracy and inheritance rules don't always work the way they do back home.
My Lawyer in Spain brings together a team of English-speaking Spanish lawyers and UK solicitors who specialise in exactly this kind of cross-border legal work, offering advice that draws on both local knowledge and international experience.
The team covers a wide range of legal matters, including tax advice, wills for Spanish assets, inheritance tax, property transactions, digital certificates, residency applications, registering holiday rentals and employment or business law.
Whether you're wondering if your Spanish assets are properly protected under a Spanish will, need clarity on inheritance tax, or want help navigating a property purchase or rental registration, there's a specialist on hand for each area.
My Lawyer in Spain has offices in Ciudad Quesada, Mojácar, Jávea, Benalmádena, Marbella and Torre del Mar, with associate offices in Valencia, Madrid, Bilbao, Galicia, Tenerife, Murcia and Mallorca.
Contact details
Calling from the UK: 0845 508 2395
Calling from Spain: 951 203 094 (international code +34)
Costa Blanca and Jávea offices: 966 943 219 (international code +34)
Website: www.mylawyerinspain.com
Get in touch for a free, confidential discussion about how they can help with your Spanish legal matter.
