Usufruct and bare ownership in Spain: who pays the non-resident tax?

How the split usually arises

Splitting a property between "usufructo" and "nuda propiedad" is common in Spanish successions and family planning. A typical case: a widow keeps the lifetime right to live in the holiday flat on the Costa Blanca, while her children hold the bare ownership and will recover full ownership on her death. The Land Registry entry and the deed tell you exactly who holds which right, and in what percentage.

Who is taxed on the imputed income

The non-resident tax on a home that is not let taxes a notional benefit: the fact of having the property at your disposal. That benefit goes to whoever can use the property. The general reading is therefore that the usufructuary declares the imputed income on Modelo 210, on the whole of the right they hold, while the bare owners do not declare it.

A short example. The cadastral value on the IBI receipt is 90,000 €, and the town applies the 2 % coefficient, so the imputed income is 1,800 €. If the mother holds the full usufruct and lives in France, she files one Modelo 210 and pays 19 %: 342 €. Her two children, living in Canada, hold the bare ownership and in principle have no return to file for that income.

If the usufruct itself is shared (for example two usufructuaries at 50 % each), each files for their half.

Cases that need a closer look

Real life is not always that tidy. Ask for advice when:

• the usufruct covers only part of the property, or only some periods;
• the property is let, because the rent then belongs to the usufructuary but the expenses may have been borne by others;
• the property is sold, as the price and the gain are split between the usufruct and the bare ownership, and the 3 % retention is applied to each seller;
• the usufructuary dies, which ends the usufruct and makes the bare owners full owners from that date.

Each person in the chain still needs a NIE as soon as they have something to file.

Where to go next

If the split comes from an inheritance, start with what to declare after inheriting a Spanish home. For ordinary co-ownership in percentages, see property owned by several people. And to check the figure for the person who does file, use the Modelo 210 calculator.