

Far-left groups the Socialist government relies upon for its parliamentary majority are calling for a clamp down on seasonal rentals that would make it harder to find temporary accommodation in Spain.
When the Socialist government caved in last year to hard-left demands for a Housing Law that rewards tenants and squatters at the expense of landlords there followed a mass exodus of landlords from the long-term rental market, and explosion in seasonal rentals not regulated by the Socialist Housing Law.
Now the same political groups and housing activists that helped destroy the long-term rental market are calling for a clampdown on seasonal rentals that landlords have been using to avoid the Socialist Spanish Housing Law, which doesn’t allow tenants and landlords freedom to negotiate anything.
Sumar – the extreme-left party in the government coalition – plus Podemos, ERC, EH Bildu and BNG have jointly proposed new rules to limit seasonal rentals and room rentals to a maximum of six months. So if, for example, students on a nine-month course in Spain need a temporary home whilst they study, the landlord would have to kick them out after six months to avoid rent controls and other costs and fines for breaking the rules.
This is just a proposal for now, but the Socialists tend to end up caving into the hard-left on housing issues, so I wouldn’t be surprised if some counterproductive rules on seasonal rentals were imposed on the country from Madrid quite soon. We now have a better idea of what the new rules might look like.