Imputed income tax in Spain for non-residents: what property owners owe
At a glance
Owning a property in Spain but not renting it out does not mean you owe no tax on it. Spanish law treats the availability of a property for personal use as generating a deemed income — even if the property sits empty all year and no actual rent is received. This is the renta imputada, or imputed income, and it is an annual tax obligation for virtually every non-resident property owner in Spain.
This guide explains why it applies to all non-residents, how it is calculated, when and how to declare it, how the tax is split when a property is partly rented and partly available for personal use, and which properties are exempt.
Why imputed income tax applies to all non-resident owners
Spanish law provides an exemption from imputed income tax for a taxpayer’s vivienda habitual — their principal private residence. This exemption is real and significant: Spanish tax residents who own the home they live in do not pay renta imputada on it.
However, this exemption is only available to Spanish tax residents. A non-resident — by definition — does not have their principal private residence in Spain. If they did, they would be spending sufficient time there to qualify as a Spanish tax resident. The result is that every Spanish property owned by a non-resident is, by definition, a second or investment property, and every such property that is not rented out is subject to imputed income tax for the period it is available for personal use.
This is one of the most common sources of non-compliance among non-resident property owners. Many assume that because they are not earning rental income, they have no Spanish tax obligation. That assumption is incorrect.
Non-residents who own Spanish property and do not rent it out must still file Modelo 210 annually to declare the imputed income. This obligation arises every year regardless of how many days the owner actually spends at the property.
How imputed income tax is calculated
The calculation has two steps: first, determine the imputed income figure; then apply the applicable tax rate.
Step 1: the imputed income figure
The imputed income is calculated as a percentage of the property’s cadastral value (valor catastral) — the administrative value assigned by the local authority, which appears on the annual IBI (council tax) bill:
- 1.1% of the cadastral value if the value has been revised within the last ten years
- 2% of the cadastral value if the last revision was more than ten years ago
Most properties in Spain have cadastral values that have not been revised recently, so the 2% rate is more common in practice — though this varies significantly by municipality. The date of the last revision is shown on the IBI receipt.
Step 2: the tax rate
The imputed income figure is then taxed at the applicable non-resident rate:
- 19% for residents of EU and EEA countries
- 24% for residents of non-EU countries — including UK owners since Brexit
Worked example — non-EU owner, cadastral value not recently revised
Worked example — EU owner, cadastral value recently revised
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Partial year: how the tax is prorated
Many non-resident owners rent their property for part of the year and use it personally — or leave it empty — for the rest. In this situation, the two tax regimes apply proportionally:
- For the days the property was rented out, rental income tax applies on the actual income received
- For the days the property was not rented and available for personal use, imputed income tax applies
The proration is calculated by dividing the annual imputed income figure by 365 (or 366 in a leap year) and multiplying by the number of days in the unrented period:
Imputed income for unrented period = (cadastral value × % rate) ÷ 365 × number of unrented days
Worked example — property rented for 90 days, available rest of year
The rental income for the 90 rented days is declared separately under the rental income tax rules. The two declarations cover different periods and are filed as separate Modelo 210 returns.
Exempt properties: when renta imputada does not apply
Not all Spanish property generates an imputed income obligation. The following situations are exempt:
Land without a dwelling
Bare land — plots without a residential building constructed on them — does not generate imputed income. The imputed income regime applies specifically to bienes inmuebles de naturaleza urbana (urban properties) that are available for use as dwellings. A plot of land, even if it is buildable, does not trigger renta imputada until a dwelling is constructed on it.
Properties under construction or not habitable
A property that is genuinely unavailable for use because it is under construction or undergoing works that render it uninhabitable is not subject to imputed income tax during that period. The key word is genuinely: the property must actually be incapable of use, not merely undergoing minor repairs or decoration. Proof of the works — building licences, contractor invoices, planning permissions — should be retained in case the AEAT requests documentation.
Once the works are complete and the property is habitable again, the imputed income obligation resumes from that point, prorated for the remaining days of the year.
Principal private residence
As explained above, the principal private residence is exempt — but only for Spanish tax residents. Non-residents cannot apply this exemption to any of their Spanish properties.
Properties used exclusively for an economic activity — commercial premises, offices, holiday rental businesses properly constituted as business activities — are treated differently and fall outside the renta imputada regime. These are subject to different rules depending on the nature and structure of the activity. If your property is registered as a tourist rental business, specific advice on the applicable regime is recommended.
Filing Modelo 210: deadline and process
Imputed income tax is declared using Modelo 210, the same form used for other non-resident income tax obligations. One return must be filed per property per tax year.
The deadline for imputed income tax is 31 December of the year following the tax year. This is later than many other tax deadlines — for example, imputed income for the 2025 tax year must be declared by 31 December 2026. This gives non-resident owners nearly two full years from the start of the tax year to file, but the obligation should not be left to the last moment: the AEAT’s electronic systems can experience congestion near the deadline.
The return is filed electronically through the Agencia Tributaria website. Non-residents without a Spanish digital certificate typically file through a tax representative. The cadastral value used is the one in force on 1 January of the tax year in question.
Missing the 31 December deadline triggers automatic surcharges: 1% rising by 1% per month of delay up to 15% if filed voluntarily before Hacienda acts, or 20% plus interest if filed after enforcement proceedings begin. Outstanding imputed income filings from previous years are also reviewed when a property is sold — arrears plus surcharges are typically recovered at the point of sale.
The connection to capital gains tax at the point of sale
When a non-resident sells a Spanish property, the buyer withholds 3% of the sale price and pays it to Hacienda as a guarantee against the seller’s Spanish tax liabilities — primarily capital gains tax. Separately, any outstanding Modelo 210 filings for previous years remain a live obligation that does not disappear at the point of sale. Hacienda can — and does — identify and pursue unpaid imputed income tax and rental income tax after the transaction has completed, with the applicable surcharges and interest added to the original amount owed.
For non-residents who have owned a property for many years without filing annual returns, this can result in a material additional liability at completion — on top of the CGT itself. Addressing outstanding filings proactively before putting a property on the market is significantly less costly than having them raised during the sale process.
Our non-resident tax compliance service covers the regularisation of outstanding annual filings, including imputed income tax returns for previous years.
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