Spain clamps down on Airbnb as tourism backlash returns for summer

The Spanish government has called for the removal of nearly 66,000 Airbnb listings on the grounds that they have “violated various norms regarding housing for tourist use”, in the face of spiraling private rental costs in larger towns and cities – doubling in a decade.

A Madrid court ruling states that Airbnb must immediately withdraw from the market 4,984 of the properties cited in Madrid, Andalusia, Catalonia, Valencia, the Basque Country and the Balearic Islands, and the ministry is now awaiting further judicial rulings on the other 60,000 or so properties.

The properties it has identified either did not provide a licence number, provided an erroneous number, or did not specify the legal status of the owner as renting on a professional basis or as a private individual.

Some local governments have also started to act against Airbnb, including Barcelona which is intending to eliminate 10,000 short let apartments within three years.

“The root cause of the affordable housing crisis in Spain is a lack of supply to meet demand,” said an Airbnb spokesperson. “Governments across the world are seeing that regulating Airbnb does not alleviate housing concerns or return homes to the market – it only hurts local families who rely on hosting to afford their homes and rising costs.”

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