Short-term vs long-term rental in Spain 2026: which actually earns a foreign owner more?

Almost every foreign owner we talk to arrives with the same spreadsheet. Ten occupied nights at €180 a night is €1,800 a month, a long-term tenant pays €1,100, so Airbnb wins by 60%. The agent who sold them the flat showed them that number. A relative in Edinburgh or Stuttgart confirmed it. The spreadsheet is on an iPad in the kitchen drawer of a rental apartment that has not covered its own IBI for three years.

By late 2026 the honest answer is almost the opposite of what that spreadsheet says. In roughly two-thirds of Spanish markets a foreign owner nets more from a long-term contract than from a tourist licence, once you price in the right occupancy, the real void months, the 24% non-resident income tax with no deductions, the 20–25% management cut, the licence that is probably frozen anyway, and the comunidad that is one assembly vote away from banning the whole activity. In the other third the short-term answer still wins, but by less than the brochures claim and only under conditions most foreign owners cannot actually hold.

This is Buvivo's 2026 guide to the comparison, written for the non-resident owner deciding what to do with a flat they already own or are about to buy. The licence regulations themselves live in our tourist rental licence guide and the brand-new NRA and EU STR regulation guide; the tenant-side mechanics of long-term letting live in our long-term rental guide. This piece is about the numbers — gross yield, net yield, taxes, and the four scenarios where the default answer flips.

The vocabulary, so the numbers mean the same thing

Spain uses at least six different acronyms for short-term rental depending on the region. Before any yield number is comparable, the words have to be.

• VUT / VFT / VV / VT / HUT / VVTD — regional tourist rental licences. VUT is Castilla y León and Castilla–La Mancha, VFT is Andalusia, VV is the Canary Islands, VT is Madrid, HUT is Catalonia, VVTD is the Balearics. All of them mean the same thing on a listing: a property legally licensed for stays under the local short-stay threshold (usually 31 days).
• NRA — Número de Registro de Alquiler. The new EU-wide short-term rental registration number that every platform (Airbnb, Booking, Vrbo, idealista short-stay) has to display and match to the host from 1 January 2026. No NRA, no listing. See the NRA guide for the mechanics.
• Alquiler de temporada — "seasonal" rental, between 32 days and 11 months, exempt from tourist licence rules but not a long-term LAU contract. A legal grey zone that every tax inspector in the country is now looking at.
• Arrendamiento de vivienda habitual — long-term let under the LAU, minimum 5-year protection for tenants (7 if the landlord is a legal person), rent indexed to the INE-published reference index in zonas tensionadas, the standard product the market calls "long-term" or "annual" let.
• Gross yield — annual rent ÷ purchase price, no costs stripped out. Useful for comparing cities, useless for deciding anything.
• Net yield — annual rent, minus every operating cost (taxes, insurance, comunidad, licence renewals, management fees, voids, repairs, platform cuts), divided by all-in purchase price including the ITP, notary, registry and lawyer fees. The only number that matters.

For the rest of this article, all yield numbers are net, and all purchase prices include acquisition costs rounded at 12% for resale or 14% for new-build. The underlying rent and occupancy data are Q3 2026 from AirDNA, Idealista, Fotocasa and Instituto Nacional de Estadística.

The headline table: net yield comparison, ten Spanish cities

This is the number the rest of the article argues for.

Market	LTR net yield	STR net yield	Delta	Default answer
Madrid centre	3.9%	4.6%	+0.7	STR, if you have a VT (frozen)
Barcelona Eixample	3.6%	n/a	—	LTR (every HUT lapses by Nov 2028)
Valencia centre	5.1%	5.3%	+0.2	LTR (within rounding)
Málaga capital	4.4%	5.9%	+1.5	STR if VFT held, else LTR
Palma de Mallorca	3.1%	n/a	—	LTR (VVTD frozen)
Sevilla centre	4.7%	5.2%	+0.5	Marginal — depends on management
Alicante city	5.4%	5.6%	+0.2	LTR (less hassle, same return)
Bilbao centre	4.2%	4.0%	–0.2	LTR wins
Murcia city	6.1%	5.3%	–0.8	LTR clearly wins
Granada centre	4.5%	5.8%	+1.3	STR if VFT, else LTR

The headline: STR only decisively beats LTR in markets where (a) the licence is still legally obtainable or defensibly transferable, and (b) tourism density keeps occupancy above about 62% at the current nightly rate. In the five of ten markets above where new licences are either frozen or being phased out, the comparison is academic. In the five that remain open, the gap is smaller than almost every foreign owner expects — and smaller than it was in 2022.

Why the gap has narrowed since 2022

Three forces compressed the STR premium between 2022 and 2026, and understanding them is the entire point of this article.

1. The new-tenant market got stronger. Long-term rents in Spain are up roughly 28% nominally since 2020. In Madrid the average new contract is €1,670/month for 80 m² in 2026, up from €1,180 in 2020. In Málaga capital it is €1,290 vs €810. The rent-cap zonas tensionadas legislation applies only to new contracts inside declared zones with an incumbent large-portfolio landlord — a foreign individual with one flat is not a large landlord and is exempt in most of Spain, though the exemption varies by autonomous community. See our zonas tensionadas guide for the specific trigger thresholds. The practical effect is that long-term rents have absorbed much of the gap STR historically delivered.

2. Short-stay occupancy fell as supply caught up. Spain had roughly 320,000 registered tourist dwellings in 2019 and roughly 430,000 by Q2 2025, despite the regional freezes. Average occupancy on AirDNA for comparable 1-bedroom listings in central Málaga fell from 71% in 2019 to 58% in Q3 2026. Nightly rates rose, but not enough to compensate.

3. The non-resident tax penalty got bigger. Rental income earned in Spain by a non-resident from a long-term let is taxed at 24% (non-EU) or 19% (EU/EEA) on the gross. EU/EEA residents can deduct allowable expenses before the 19% hits. Non-EU residents — the UK since 2021, Americans, Canadians, Australians, the Swiss, every Latin American — pay 24% of gross rent with zero deductions. The arithmetic punishes short-term lettings harder because the gross is higher and the real costs are higher. Our modelo 210 guide walks through exactly what gets filed and when. If you are American see also the American buyer's guide and if you are British the British buyer's guide.

A worked example: Málaga capital, €280,000 flat, 75 m²

To make the comparison concrete, here is the full spreadsheet for a representative 2-bedroom flat in Málaga capital bought by a non-EU owner in Q4 2026, held for ten years, rented either long-term or short-term. Numbers rounded for readability; the model is available on request.

Purchase side, both scenarios:

• Asking price: €280,000
• ITP (Andalusia 7%): €19,600
• Notary + Registro + gestoría: €2,800
• Lawyer (1% + VAT): €3,388
• Furniture (STR only): €14,000
• All-in cost LTR: €305,788
• All-in cost STR: €319,788

Long-term let scenario (foreign owner, non-EU, Modelo 210)

• Gross rent: €1,450/month × 12 = €17,400/year
• Vacancy allowance (6 weeks over 5 years = 2.3%): –€400
• Effective gross: €17,000
• IBI (Málaga, urban): –€580
• Comunidad (medium-density block): –€1,200
• Non-resident home insurance: –€320
• Repairs (1% of property value/year): –€2,800
• Annual gestoría + Modelo 210: –€400
• Property management (5% of rent, self-manage from abroad adds roughly double this in hassle): –€870
• Net before tax: €10,830
• Non-resident tax: 24% × €17,000 = –€4,080 (no deductions for non-EU)
• Net after tax: €6,750
• Net yield on all-in cost: 2.2%

Hold on — that number looks bad. It is bad. Non-EU non-resident long-term letting is the worst tax regime in the European Union. Compare to the same scenario with EU/EEA residency:

• Net before tax: €10,830
• 19% of net (EU residents deduct expenses): –€2,058
• Net after tax: €8,772
• Net yield on all-in cost: 2.9%

That gap — 70 basis points — is pure passport tax. See the Beckham Law guide for the one way a tax-resident non-EU owner can sidestep it.

Short-term let scenario (held VFT licence, Málaga)

• Average nightly rate (Q3 2026 AirDNA): €142
• Occupancy: 58%
• Gross nights: 212 × €142 = €30,104/year
• Platform fee (Airbnb host service 3%, Booking commission averaged in): –€1,200
• Cleaning passed to guest (neutral): €0
• Linens, consumables, Wi-Fi, streaming: –€1,400
• IBI: –€580
• Comunidad (STR unit, higher cuota where allowed): –€1,800
• Insurance (higher premium for STR): –€520
• Repairs (STR wears faster — 2% of property value): –€5,600
• Licence renewal / inspection: –€120
• Property management (full-service STR manager, 20% of net rent is normal in Málaga): –€4,460
• Net before tax: €14,424
• Non-resident tax: 24% × €30,104 = –€7,225 (non-EU, no deductions)
• Net after tax: €7,199
• Net yield on all-in cost: 2.3%

For an EU owner deducting expenses:

• 19% × €14,424 = –€2,741
• Net after tax: €11,683
• Net yield on all-in cost: 3.7%

What the numbers actually say

For the non-EU owner, LTR and STR in Málaga end up within €450 a year of each other after everything. The STR owner handled 65 check-ins, three noise complaints, two broken appliances, one lost key emergency, and one comunidad special assembly about the licence. The LTR owner handled one tenant for twelve months.

For the EU owner, STR wins by 80 basis points — real money, but only if the licence is held, the comunidad allows it, and the owner is willing to run the operation like a small hospitality business.

The four scenarios where the default answer flips

The headline table says LTR wins most of the time. There are four specific situations where that flips, and foreign owners who fit one of them often misread the general advice and under-earn.

1. You can live on-site part of the year and run it yourself

If you spend 3–5 months a year in Spain anyway — the classic snowbird profile — self-managed STR removes the 20% manager cut. On the Málaga example that pushes STR net yield from 2.3% to roughly 3.7% for a non-EU owner, pulling clear of LTR. The constraint is real: 60+ nights a year of hands-on operation is not "passive income".

2. The property is in a top 20% micro-location for tourism

STR averages hide a bimodal distribution. In the five blocks closest to Málaga cathedral, Playa del Postiguet in Alicante, the Barri Gòtic edges of Barcelona where some HUTs still have transfer value, Triana in Sevilla, or the Albaicín in Granada, occupancy averages 72–80% rather than 55–60%, and nightly rates sit 30–40% above the city average. In those micro-locations STR wins decisively even for non-EU owners. Everywhere else — more than 90% of urban Spanish stock — the average applies.

3. You already hold a legally-transferable licence

In Barcelona, where every HUT lapses by November 2028 and no new ones have been issued since 2014, a transferable HUT attached to a flat used to add €40,000–€120,000 of market value and three or four years of guaranteed STR income to any purchase. The 2028 phase-out is the final deadline; after that the licence has zero continuation value and buyers should treat the flat as LTR-only. In the Balearics VVTD stock is similarly finite. If you already hold one of these, STR is the right choice until the regulation catches up — but only until the regulation catches up.

4. You are willing to run alquiler de temporada instead

The 32-day to 11-month "seasonal" rental is a legal regime that falls outside tourist licence rules and outside the full LAU protection. For foreign owners who want above-LTR yields without a VFT/VT/HUT, seasonal is becoming the rational default. Monthly rates in Madrid centre for furnished 2-bedroom seasonal lets are routinely €1,900–€2,400/month in 2026 — a 25–40% premium over LTR — with no tourist licence required and no comunidad veto. The risk is tax reclassification: the Agencia Tributaria has been auditing seasonal lets that look like disguised tourist rentals since late 2024. Document the stated purpose of each stay (study, temporary work, medical treatment) and always sign a written seasonal-use contract that explicitly references article 3 of the LAU.

The hidden costs almost every foreign owner under-counts

Three line items distort the comparison in favour of STR when owners build their first spreadsheet. Fix these and the picture shifts.

Repairs and wear. STR wears a property roughly twice as fast as LTR. Sofas, mattresses, kitchen appliances and painted walls in a flat that sleeps four strangers a week for 212 nights a year will need replacement on a 4–6 year cycle rather than the 10–12 of LTR use. Budget 2.0% of property value per year for STR, not the 1.0% most owners pencil in. The renovations guide covers typical Spanish refurb costs.

Comunidad special levies. Comunidades de propietarios have had the legal power to raise the cuota of tourist units by up to 20% since the May 2023 LAU reform, and about 35% of urban comunidades that allow STR have voted this in. The same reform lets a 3/5 supermajority ban new tourist activity entirely — which has happened in roughly one in six Spanish blocks that previously permitted it. Budget an extra €600–€1,200 a year in STR mode and model the risk that a 3/5 vote ends the activity in year three.

Insurance. Standard home insurance excludes tourist lettings in Spain. A dedicated STR policy runs €400–€700 a year on a 2-bedroom flat versus €180–€280 for LTR cover. If an owner lets without declaring STR use, a single guest claim will void the policy. The home insurance guide covers the specific wording that distinguishes compliant cover.

Modelo 210 timing. Non-resident income tax is filed quarterly for rentals, not annually — quarterly for Q1 ends 20 April, Q2 20 July, Q3 20 October, Q4 20 January. STR with 65 bookings a quarter generates more Modelo 210 line items and typically pushes gestoría fees from €400/year to €700–€900/year. Factor in. See the gestor guide for how to price this.

The regulatory clock most foreign owners ignore

Every short-term rental projection should have an explicit licence expiry date on the first page. In 2026 the realistic planning horizons are:

• Barcelona: every HUT lapses by 30 November 2028. No renewals. Treat STR income as a 24-month finite stream.
• Balearics: VVTD freeze indefinite. Existing licences remain valid but a second-chamber vote in late 2026 or 2027 may cap duration. Model STR with a 10-year expiry assumption.
• Canarias: 2024 reform retroactively invalidates VV licences in residential-only blocks. About 22% of existing licences are expected to be withdrawn between 2026 and 2028.
• Madrid: 2025 reform requires independent entry and ground-floor or first-floor location for new VT. Existing VTs are grandfathered but non-transferable to a different owner in most districts.
• Andalusia: VFT remains issuable but each comunidad has veto power since mid-2024. About 40% of blocks in central Málaga have voted to ban or restrict since the veto came in.
• Valencia: March 2024 framework requires a new informe de compatibilidad urbanística before each renewal. Expect 15–25% of existing permits to fail renewal on technical grounds through 2027.

The pattern is consistent: STR regulation in Spain is tightening, not loosening, in every autonomous community that matters for foreign owners. A ten-year projection that assumes continued STR legality is a projection with a 25–60% chance of being wrong, depending on the region. LTR has no equivalent regulatory cliff.

What to actually do

If you already own and are deciding how to let:

1. Run both the LTR and the STR number for your exact flat using the worked-example template above, with your tax residency, your city's current rent for your size and floor level, and current AirDNA data for your specific postcode (not the city average).
2. Apply a licence-risk discount to the STR net yield based on the regulatory clock in your region — the risk-adjusted STR yield is what you compare to LTR, not the raw one.
3. If LTR net is within 50 basis points of risk-adjusted STR net, pick LTR. The hassle delta is worth at least 50 bps.
4. If STR wins by more than 100 bps, confirm the licence status in writing from the ayuntamiento and the comunidad president before committing — not from the agent.
5. Price in your own time. A reasonable opportunity cost for a non-resident owner handling STR remotely is €40–€60 an hour; a typical 2-bedroom flat generates 60–120 hours of owner work per year even with a 20% manager. That is €2,400–€7,200 a year of your time, not a cost most spreadsheets show.

If you are buying specifically to let:

1. In 2026 the right default for a foreign buyer in most of Spain is LTR, or seasonal where the rules allow. STR is a legitimate strategy in a short list of specific micro-locations with legally secure licences, held by owners who are prepared to run them as small hospitality businesses.
2. Do not let the agent anchor you on gross STR revenue. Ask for the net yield after the Málaga-example framework above, and then compare.
3. Consider the long tail. The LTR tenant who stays four years pays you back the acquisition friction, builds property-register history that helps on resale, and never calls you at 11pm about a jammed lock in a language you half-speak. These are not line items. They are the quiet reasons most experienced Spanish landlords eventually choose LTR for everything except their best beachfront unit.

The one-line answer

For non-EU owners outside the top-20% tourism micro-locations, long-term letting wins after tax, wins after risk, and wins after hassle, in 2026. STR wins in exactly the specific conditions this article has tried to isolate — and if yours do not meet all of them, pick LTR and use the savings in hassle to go actually enjoy the country you bought a home in.

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Buvivo is a reverse property search marketplace for Spain. Post what you are looking for in one post; licensed agents and owners with matching properties — including STR-licensed, LTR-compliant and seasonal-let-ready units — pay to pitch you. It is the one way to see the whole market without clicking on 400 listings. Post a request in English or read our how-it-works page.