Update May 2014: Barcelona City Council suspends the issue of holiday rental licences for a six month period
Update Feb 2014: Information on a modfication to the licence system for holiday rentals in Catalonia
Spain-holiday.com has been hot on the tail of the new holiday rentals law, ready to bring you updated information as it is released. The holiday rental law in Catalonia, or H.U.T - Habitatge d'Ús Turístic, was implemented back in 2012, giving Catalonia a head start on getting the licence procedures functioning, more or less, efficiently.
We wrote an article back in May on the regulation of holiday rentals in Catalonia. After chatting this week with the extremely helpful, ‘Direcció General de Turismo’, we are able to provide further information on how to legally rent out your privately-owned holiday home for touristic purposes. This option comes under the title of ‘Vivienda de Uso Turístico’.
The procedure starts at your local town hall, where you will need to register your application for a ‘H.U.T number’. H.U.T stands for Habitatge d'Us Turistic, or Licence for Touristic Use.
Note: If your home is situated within an urbanisation where the community rules do not allow owners to rent out their properties as holiday rentals, the Town Hall will be unable to give you permission.
Requirements:
To apply for your H.U.T. number you will be asked to submit an application, together with documentation for your property, you will also need to qualify that your property meets the standard criteria as set out in the Decree.
Once you have been issued your H.U.T. number, your property must be maintained to the correct standards at all times and you will need to register every guest occupancy with the Guardia Civil
The requirements can vary depending on the local municipality:
- Cedula d' Habitatge (Occupancy certificate). If you don’t already have this document, you can apply for one at the town hall. You will need it before you apply for your H.U.T.
- The property must be adequately furnished and equipped with functional appliances and utensils for immediate occupancy
- You must leave contact numbers for the renter, to reach both the owner or a representative, and local emergency services: police, hospital (ambulance) and the town hall
- You must take copies of the passports for every guest during their occupancy and log them with the Guardia Civil
- The property should undergo regular maintenance and kept up-to-date
- An Official Complaint Form should be made available to the renter
- The property must never be occupied by more people than the maximum stated in the occupancy certificate
Procedure:
Once you are confident you have all of the above requirements in place, go to the town hall and apply for the Vivienda de Uso Turístico licence
- There is a minimal procedure fee, which varies by town hall
- You will be registered to pay the municipal licence tax. Again, the cost will vary depending on which municipality your property is located in
Once you’ve presented the documents and applied for the licence, your application will be submitted to the ‘Direcció General de Turisme’, who are responsible for approving the application and designating the HUT number . This is not something you can organise yourself.
Your HUT number will correspond with the province your property is located in, i.e. HUTB (Barcelona), HUTT (Tarragona), HUTG (Girona), HUTL (Lleida), HUTCC (Catalonia Central), HUTTE (Terres de l’Ebre) and HUTVA (Val d'Aran).
You must not start to rent your holiday home until it has been approved and a HUT number allocated.
You will then be given access to an online platform where you will be required to register every renter that stays in your home - name, contact details, passport number, duration of stay. The information is documented with the local police in case of any issues arising during their stay. This may seem intrusive, but is in accordance with the law on public safety in holiday accommodation establishments.
Types of accommodation and tourist establishments
There are six types of touristic licence in Catalonia: travel agencies, tourist apartments, campsites, homes for tourist use, hotels and rural homes
On www.spain-holiday.com we accept advertisments for: homes for tourist use, tourist apartments and rural homes.
Do not confuse tourist apartments "apartamentos turísticos” with a private holiday rental. The "apartamento turístico” is a managed tourist establishment which requires an opening licence ‘Licencia de Apertura’, amongst other specific requirements. It has a different HUT number. Codes for "apartamentos turÍsticos” are AT/ ATB, ATG, ATL, ATT, ATCC. ATTE or ATVA.
You can read about how to apply for a licence for Touristic Apartments here.
Here you can read about how to inscribe for rural accommodation ‘casas rurales’. This type of licence is not referring to a privately-owned holiday home in the country. It applies to managed rural accommodation offering touristic services. This type of business also needs an opening licence. The codes for Casas Rurales are: P/ PB, PG, PL, PT, PCC, PTE or PVA.
There is not a similar page in English, which explains how to apply for your 'privately-owned' holiday home licence. But follow the instructions above and you shouldn't have a problem
Once you have registered your private holiday home ‘vivienda de uso turistíco’, it will appear under the relevant section on the Generalitat de Catalunya website. It’s a downloadable excel file that lists all registered homes with licences.
Catalonia have implemented a relatively straight-forward process to apply for your licence. Let’s hope the rest of the communities follow suit.
Read more: Licence information for holiday rentals in the Balearic Islands, Asturias and the Valencian Community. If you want to find out more information beforehand, we recommend you read our previous article, The lowdown on the new holiday rentals law in Spain.
We also recommend Robert Black's concise guide to the Holiday Rental Law in Spain. Available for Kindle from Amazon. It's worth a read.
Please also check our update Feb 2014: Information on a modfication to the licence system for holiday rentals in Catalonia