Valencia is witnessing a notable price premium for properties with tourist licenses. Real estate agencies report that homes with licensed holiday use are selling for around an extra 100,000 euros in the city of Valencia. Investors are purchasing these residential buildings as a business, calculating the premium based on the previous year’s revenue. Buyers aim for an annual return of 10 to 15 percent per unit, figures that substantially exceed typical yields from traditional residential rentals. The regional government has introduced a new regulation for tourist flats that requires a fresh license if a unit is transferred, in an effort to curb speculative activity.
The same pattern appears in commercial ground-floor spaces, where the value has doubled due to the tourist-apartment venture. The boom in vacation rentals has risen steadily, prompting authorities to intervene. The tourism association Exceltur warns that the number of tourist flats in Valencia grew by 40 percent over the past year. Specifically, the city now hosts 27,975 tourist units, up from 19,921 a year earlier, surpassing the roughly 22,000 hotel beds in the city. Experts say this anomaly is tied to Valencia’s attractiveness and ongoing hotel projects that have yet to receive licenses because of bureaucratic hurdles.
This dynamic has drawn investors to the city’s early and ground-floor commercial spaces, the only places where tourist flats can legally operate in Valencia. Real estate agencies acknowledge that the market was like a jungle until two months ago, when the city council implemented a moratorium preventing new tourist flats from opening. Investors are now evaluating the broader policy framework approved by the regional government, which aims to slow down speculation amid rising social concern about the unchecked spread of vacation homes.
Pisos que llegan a valer el doble
Cristina Recasens, founder of Recasens Real Estate, confirms that flats with a tourist license can fetch twice the price of a comparable unit nearby that lacks permission to operate as a vacation home. She recalls selling a first-floor unit in the Carmen district immediately for 240,000 euros, a price far above its underlying value. The buyer viewed it as a business and paid based on the revenue generated the previous year. In the world of tourist apartments, investors seek returns of 10 to 15 percent annually.
Property owners leasing tourist flats in Valencia earn on average about 500 euros more per month than those renting traditional homes. The roughly 7,000 properties currently rented to visitors generate an average monthly income near 2,000 euros. The market is bolstered by a tourism boom and a hotel shortage that keeps demand high.
Locals often voice concern about the rapid transformation of neighborhoods as vacation rentals proliferate. A social media post from June 2024 highlights worries about tourist flats spreading across the city, including some that operate illegally. The message notes that rising rents push workers outward to nearby towns such as Massamagrell, about 15 kilometers away.
Locales comerciales
Commercial premises have not followed a different pattern. A ground-floor space with potential for conversion into tourist housing can command twice the price of a similar commercial unit on the same street that cannot be used for vacation purposes, according to Recasens. The Valencia Real Estate Agents Association agrees with this assessment. In the past two years, the average sale price of commercial spaces has risen by about 25 to 30 percent.
The disruption in both residential and commercial sectors underlines a broader tension: the city’s bid to balance tourism growth with affordable living and working conditions for residents. As authorities tighten controls and investors recalibrate strategies, Valencia’s property market remains a barometer for how holiday rental policy shapes urban economics.
(Attribution: industry insights from Recasens Real Estate and the Valencia API, with market data on occupancy and pricing led by local market observations.)