Barcelona continues to take steps on the road to eliminating all tourist apartment licenses by November 2028. Now, the City Council has joined the Finestreta Única Digital d’Arrendaments (FUDA), an initiative of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Agenda that seeks to improve collaboration between administrations and optimize the management of data on tourist or short-term housing.
This new regulation requires the registration of all tourist accommodations in a single Registry of rentals, which will include detailed information such as the exact address of the property, the link to its advertisement on digital platforms and statistics on its activity.
How does the Finestreta Única Digital d’Arrendaments work?
Tourist rental platforms (such as Airbnb, for example) must send monthly the data of their ads and verify that each property has a valid registration number. If they detect invalid or suspended registrations, they will be obliged to remove the ad within 48 hours.
This system seeks to improve the joint work between public administrations and digital platforms, and is a decisive step in Barcelona’s strategy to recover housing for residential use.
This tool will centralize all the information on short-stay or tourist rental apartments to improve transparency.
End of tourist licenses in 2028
Joining FUDA comes in a context in which Barcelona has already announced its intention to eliminate all tourist apartment licenses by November 2028. This will affect the more than 10,000 tourist accommodations that currently exist in the city, which will have to return to the residential market once their licenses expire.
With this measure, the consistory aims to curb tourist pressure on neighborhoods, reduce real estate speculation and guarantee the right to housing in a stressed market.