The Buyers Guide

The NIE. The Número de Identidad de Extranjero is the tax number issued to any foreigner with fiscal business in Spain, and nothing happens without it. You need one to buy, to open a bank account, to pay taxes and to put utilities in your name. It can be obtained at a Spanish consulate, in Spain by appointment, or by your lawyer acting under a power of attorney.

A Spanish bank account. Completion funds are normally paid by banker’s cheque or transfer drawn on a Spanish account, which then carries the direct debits for IBI, utilities and community fees. Expect full source-of-funds checks; assembling that evidence early is the single easiest way to protect a completion date.

An independent lawyer. Not the seller’s, not the developer’s, not the one the agent shares an office with. Yours is the only party in the transaction whose sole duty is to you: they run due diligence, draft and review the contracts, calculate and pay the taxes and lodge the deed. Fees usually run around 1 to 1.5% of the price plus VAT, and it is the best value in the transaction. Choose them before you choose the house.

Power of attorney. A poder signed before a notary, at home with an apostille or in Spain, lets your lawyer sign on your behalf. Most of our international clients complete without flying in. Arrange it at the reservation stage rather than the week before completion.

A fiscal representative. Non-resident owners appoint a representative, usually the lawyer or a tax adviser, to receive tax notifications and file the annual non-resident returns. It is inexpensive and it stops small filing failures becoming penalties.

After the deed. Registration at the Registro de la Propiedad, agreement of the cadastral record at Catastro, buildings insurance, and utility contracts transferred into your name. We coordinate this with your lawyer so nothing is left half done.

Residency is a separate question. Buying has never required it; an NIE is enough, and non-residents own, let and sell freely. Spain closed the Golden Visa on 3 April 2025, so no purchase of any size now grants residence. The routes to living here full time are the Non-Lucrative and Digital Nomad visas, and our guide to Spanish visas sets both out in full.

Not every property here sits on the same legal footing. Marbella’s planning framework has been rewritten, annulled and rewritten again over two decades, and the hillsides carry the consequences. A house can be beautiful, occupied and openly for sale and still be irregular, and the file decides that, not the finish. Establishing which category a property falls into is a normal part of the advice we give.

The categories. Older plans, Marbella’s 1986 plan among them, work with urban land, developable land and rustic or protected land. The Andalusian LISTA law has since reduced this to two classes, urban and rústico, with sectorised land carrying the rural regime plus a delimited transformation action. Whichever vocabulary a file uses, the practical question is the same: can this be built on now, later under conditions, or not at all?

Reserved and restricted land. Some parcels sit within or beside areas held for infrastructure, environmental protection or pending regularisation. Properties there may be fully regularised, partly regularised, or still uncertain. Due diligence has to establish the actual status, and a first occupation licence on its own does not settle it.

What we do about it. We work with architects and urban law specialists to read the planning file for anything with a question over it: zoning status, past and pending appeals or enforcement, buildability ratio, height, occupancy and permitted use, and for land, road access, drainage, power and water rights.

Where a client intends to build or reform, we commission a viability study before an offer rather than after one, so that the price reflects what can actually be done with the property.

A case in point. A client approached us to acquire a countryside finca in Marbella’s interior, marketed as a legal home. Our review put part of it outside the urban zone and flagged buildability inconsistencies, and a viability assessment then found an overlap with reserved land. The price was renegotiated, counsel and a technical architect began retrospective licensing, and the purchase completed with the development scope understood rather than assumed.

IBI, the local property tax. Charged annually by the town hall on the cadastral value, which is usually well below market value. The statutory band for urban property is 0.4% to 1.1% and each municipality sets its rate within it. A separate rubbish collection charge is billed alongside, and is modest.

Community fees. Payable wherever the property sits in a development or urbanisation with shared gardens, pools, lifts or security. The range on this coast is very wide, from a small monthly figure in a simple block to four figures a month in a large gated estate with 24 hour security. Ask for the current budget and the last three sets of minutes before you commit, not after.

Non-resident income tax. Non-resident owners pay Spanish tax on the property whether or not it is let. If it is not let, an imputed income of 1.1% or 2% of the cadastral value, depending when that value was last revised, is taxed at 19% for residents of the EU, Norway and Iceland and 24% for everyone else. If it is let, EU and EEA residents are taxed at 19% on net rent after deductible expenses, and other non-residents at 24% on the gross.

Wealth tax, and the tax above it. Andalucía applies a 100% relief on the regional wealth tax, so the regional charge is effectively neutralised.

The national Impuesto Temporal de Solidaridad de las Grandes Fortunas still reaches large estates: after the €700,000 allowance, which applies to residents and non-residents alike, it bites on net wealth above €3 million, at rates from 1.7% to 3.5%. Spanish residents also have a further allowance of up to €300,000 against a main home. Andalucía’s relief is structured so that a taxpayer caught by the national tax pays broadly the same amount either way rather than twice.

And if you hold through a company. Corporate tax on net rental profit, annual accounts filed at the Companies Registry, and accounting and compliance fees every year. Budget for them from the outset.

The transaction takes weeks. Ownership takes years, and most of what determines whether a client enjoys the house happens after the notary rather than before.

The first month. Utilities transferred and put on direct debit, internet installed, buildings and contents cover in place, alarm and access sorted, and the cadastral and registry records confirmed as agreeing with each other. We coordinate this so that nothing is left in the seller’s name.

Work on the house. Renovation, landscaping, a pool, an extension or simply furnishing a new build. We renovate our own properties here, so the contractors, architects and trades we introduce are people we have used ourselves and would use again. Where a project needs a licence, we get that question answered before a budget is agreed rather than after work has started.

Relocating rather than visiting. Schools and enrolment, healthcare both public and private, registration at the town hall, vehicle registration and licence exchange, and moving pets. None of it is difficult and all of it is easier with someone who has done it before.

If it is a new build. Snagging is normal and there is a window for it. Defects reported in the first year are the developer’s to put right and the structural warranty runs for ten. Keep the handover pack, the guarantees and the as-built plans together, because they are what a future buyer’s lawyer will ask to see.

Leaving it empty. Key holding, inspection, cleaning, gardening and pool maintenance through managers we know, so that a property left for four months is found in the state it was left in.

The long view. An annual read on what the property is worth against the wider market, drawn from our quarterly market reports and official Spanish sources rather than from asking prices. Advice on letting it, on inheritance and succession, and on when and how to sell. Most of our sellers are people we bought for years earlier, which is the only measure of this part of the job that means anything.