New tourist rental law divides opinion

A regulation on tourist housing that has “arrived too late and brings little”, is how some groups see the new holiday rental legislation.

If there was one area where the clamour for effective regulation was multiplying day by day, it was in the regulation of tourist accommodation. However, the decree approved by the Junta de Andalucía, which is due to come into force on 22 February, has not convinced everyone.

It is a regulation that gives Andalucian town councils the power to limit the maximum number of tourist homes per building or per area with the aim of preventing their proliferation in locations saturated with short-term holiday rental properties.

Some have welcomed the legislation: the mayor of Malaga, Francisco de la Torre, is confident that it will be possible to, “stop the creation of flats in areas that are saturated and continue working to improve the quality of these accommodations”. He defines saturation as, “areas where tourist rentals make up half of the properties”.

More private rentals than hotels

Carlos Pérez-Lanzac, president of the Andalucian Tourist Housing Association (AvvaPro) is also positive about the new regulation in general terms, “the next step must be the fight against illegal and clandestine supply”, he said, adding, “in municipalities like Mijas for instance, the proportion of tourist housing is greater than that of hotels”.

However, for the residents who suffer daily from the proliferation of tourist accommodation, the law leaves the feeling that it provides few solutions. According to the president of the Centro Antiguo de Málaga, Carlos Carrera, the decree, “recognises what is already known: Town Councils already had powers before and now it simply continues to have them, although it is true that councils can make modifications to be stricter or not”.

However, in Carrera’s opinion, “the new law does not address the root of the issue and ignores the fundamental fact that these properties are not hotels”.