SPANISH prime minister Pedro Sanchez is planning to stop people from the UK buying second homes in the country in a bid to address a housing crisis.
The announcement to prevent people outside the EU from buying housing in Spain unless they reside in the country follows his proposal last week to put a tax of up to 100% on such property deals.
Sanchez is attempting to address anger in Spain over soaring property prices and a lack of housing. In Madrid, rents have risen around 60% in the last decade.
Sanchez told a gathering of his Socialist party: “We are going to propose to ban non-EU foreigners from buying houses in our country, in cases where neither they nor their families reside here and they are just speculating with those homes.”
Sanchez said non-residents from outside the EU bought around 27,000 houses and apartments in Spain in 2023.
According to the conservative main opposition party, People’s Party (PP), that figure accounted for “a total of 4% of all sales and purchases”.
Last year, Spain announced that it was scrapping its Golden Visa scheme that allows wealthy people from outside the EU to obtain residency permits by investing more than half a million euros in real estate.
Those who already have a golden visa may retain it but no new ones will be issued.
According to real estate registry data, people from the UK led the way for foreign property buyers in 2023 with 9.5% of the total transactions by non-Spaniards.
A total of 638,552 property deals were sealed in 2023, of which foreigners — including EU nationals — carried out slightly more than 19%, according to housing ministry figures.
The share reached 31.5% and 28.6% respectively in the Balearic and Canary Islands, and 29.2% in the eastern Valencia region.
Sanchez said the plan for a 100% tax was inspired by similar schemes in Denmark and Canada.
Canada bans non-resident foreigners from buying homes in a bid to make the market more affordable, a measure introduced in 2023 and extended to January 1, 2027.
In Denmark, foreigners can buy property if they have been living there for at least five years and have a special permit, though the conditions are eased for EU nationals.
Sue Wilson, the head of Bremain in Spain, a group with 6000 members that campaigns to protect the rights of Britons living in Spain, was critical of the latest plans.
She said: “Many British nationals on lower incomes, who had hopes of retirement on the Costas, have already had their dreams shattered [by Brexit].
“These new measures — assuming they are passed by parliament — will only add to the barriers we face in Europe as non-EU citizens.”
Joan Carlos Amaro, a real estate analyst and professor of economics at the Esade Business School in Barcelona, said: ““Anything that puts up barriers and stops the market from functioning ends up hurting everyone.
“These foreigners that come, they spend money, the houses they live in have to be built and that creates jobs.”
