Renting it out · 2 July 2026 · 6 min read
Holiday lets in Andalusia: licences, rules and realistic returns.
“It rents for €1,200 a week in summer” is the sentence that sells half the apartments on this coast. Sometimes it is even true. But between that sentence and money in your account sit a licence, a community of owners, running costs and tax, and buyers who skip the middle part buy themselves a problem.
The licence comes first
Short-term tourist rentals in Andalusia require registration as a vivienda de uso turístico (VUT). Without the registration number you cannot legally advertise on Booking or Airbnb, and the platforms increasingly enforce it. The property itself has to meet requirements: things like air conditioning, ventilation and minimum standards that older apartments do not always pass.
The rules here have moved several times in recent years, and enforcement has tightened. Treat anything you read, including this, as a snapshot: the licence question belongs in your lawyer's due diligence, answered for the specific apartment, in writing, before you sign.
The community can say no
This is the one that surprises people. Recent changes to Spanish law allow a community of owners to restrict or ban new tourist lets in their building by a qualified majority vote. Some buildings on the coast have done exactly that, and buildings that allow lets can change their statutes after you buy.
So if letting is core to your plan, check the community statutes and recent minutes before the arras, and prefer buildings where short lets are established rather than merely not-yet-banned. Your lawyer can request all of it.
The realistic numbers
A well-located two-bed near the beach in a town like Fuengirola can gross a strong summer: peak weeks do fetch €1,000 or more. But a year is not made of peak weeks. Realistic occupancy, a management company taking 15 to 25% (you are not doing changeovers from Limerick), cleaning, utilities, community fees, insurance, platform commissions and Spanish tax on the rental income all eat into the headline.
As a planning rule, we tell buyers: a properly run holiday let on this coast tends to end up with a net yield in the low single digits on the purchase price. Decent money that offsets your running costs and pays for your own flights, absolutely. A property that “pays for itself”? Run those exact numbers for the exact apartment before you believe it.
The two-buyer test
The best letting apartments (central, busy, near the noise) are often not the apartments you would want to spend August in yourself. Decide which buyer you are before you search, because “a bit of both” usually delivers neither. We wrote more on that trade-off in the seven mistakes guide.