Do I pay Spanish tax if I only use my property for holidays?

Personal use is not an exemption

It is a common belief that a holiday home only becomes taxable once it is rented out. In Spain the reverse logic applies: a non-resident's home that is not let is taxed precisely because it is reserved for the owner's enjoyment. The number of nights you actually spend there does not change the amount.

The same applies when you let family or friends stay for free. No rent changes hands, so for the tax office the home remains at your disposal and produces imputed income.

How the holiday months are counted

What counts is the number of days you owned the property and did not rent it out. If you kept it to yourself all year, that is the full year. If you let it for six weeks in summer, those days move to a rental declaration and the rest of the year stays as imputed income.

Example: a townhouse in Nerja with a cadastral value of €110,000, in a town at 2%. Imputed income for a full year is €2,200. A Dublin-based owner pays €418 at 19%; a London-based owner pays €528 at 24%. If the same house had been let for 73 days of a 365-day year, the imputed part would cover 292 days: €2,200 × 292/365 = €1,760, so €334.40 at 19% or €422.40 at 24%, plus the separate rental return.

Does it matter who uses it?

Not for the amount. It matters only if money changes hands. Even a modest rent from a friend turns those days into a letting, with its own rules. Informal arrangements are worth writing down.

Keeping it simple

For a holiday home you never let, the return is the same each year as long as the cadastral value does not change. Keep last year's IBI receipt, check the value, and file within the window. The calculator gives the figure for your town, and the average cost page shows typical ranges. The background is in the guide to imputed income.