“Flat in Poblenou for 675 euros. Features: a third, no elevator and 2 bedrooms in almost 50m2“. Another case: “refurbished apartment for 700 euros in the heart of l’Eixample, 3 bedrooms, 75m2“. They look like ads from another era, but they are from just 10 years ago in Barcelona.
Thanks to the website Wayback Machine, where any user can store screenshots of Internet pages to preserve them over time, we have compiled some ads that today would be completely out of market in Barcelona in the face of soaring rents in recent years.
Renting an apartment in Barcelona has increased at a rate of 8.8% per year in the last decade, according to a Fotocasa report from 2024. Anyone who has recently visited real estate portals will have quickly realized that the ads we mentioned at the beginning are a thing of the past, that they have been framed in this Internet time machine.
In 2024, the average rental price in Barcelona is around 1,200 euros per month. A record that will surely be surpassed this 2025, in view of the monthly increases that accumulate rents since the beginning of the year and that is already situated according to Idealista above 20 euros /m2 on average in the province of Barcelona, a historical maximum.
Limit to rent in Barcelona
In view of this situation, since March 2024, Barcelona has a rent price control for new contracts as it has been declared a “stressed area” in the rental market.
The law provides for the application of this index in 2 assumptions: that the landlord is a large landlord (more than 5 apartments owned) or that the property being advertised has never been rented in the last 5 years.
For private landlords with less than 5 properties, the law only limits the rent to a price freeze compared to the previous rental contract. Or a 10% increase if the property has been renovated in the last two years.
More seasonal rentals, a legal loophole
This pricing has led many landlords to opt to exploit the legal loophole governing seasonal rentals, and that below 12 months of rent, the price can be liberalized and rented to the highest bidder.
A trend that could stop working if the seasonal rental regulation agreed between the government and ERC, Comuns and CUP is finally approved, and which establishes that seasonal rentals are also subject to the rent cap.
The most expensive neighborhood to rent an apartment in Barcelona now.
A study by the real estate portal Fotocasa in 2024 identified El Camp de l’Arpa del Clot as the most expensive neighborhood to rent an apartment in Barcelona: 23.02 €/m². A ranking that also included neighborhoods such as Diagonal Mar i el Front Marítim in Poblenou (22.83 €/m²), El Camp d’en Grassot i Gràcia Nova (22.82 €/m²) and El Raval (22.66 €/m²).
L’Antiga Esquerra de l’Eixample (22.04 €/m²), according to the same study, was one of the top 20 most expensive neighborhoods in Spain.
Affordable rent in Barcelona
There are several public developments that will offer affordable rental housing in Barcelona during 2025. Last May, Barcelona began the process of awarding 234 subsidized housing units in the Illa Acer development, in addition to the Illa Glòries, which was inaugurated last February.
The same trend in the sale and purchase of housing.
If we analyze the prices of 10 years ago in real estate portals, the trend is the same in the sale and purchase. Apartments for sale for about 2,300 euros per square meter. Today, in the same area, calculated with ads from 2025, the price exceeds 4,500 €/m2.