Spain’s Supreme Court has invalidated the procedure for introducing a unified registry of short-term rentals (tourist or seasonal), regulated by Royal Decree 1312/2024 of 23 December, which came into force on 1 July 2025. In its ruling No. 620/2026, the court considers that the state does not have the authority to create a national registry that duplicates existing regional registries in the field of tourist rentals.
What the Spanish Supreme Court decided
The appeal was filed by the government of the Valencian Community against the state regulation that governed the procedure of the Unified Rental Registry and created a single digital window for collecting and exchanging data related to short-term housing rentals. In the Supreme Court’s ruling, the appeal was partially upheld: only the provisions creating the so-called “unified rental registry” were annulled, but not those regulating the single digital rental window, the obligations of online platforms to transmit data and the actual transmission of data for statistical purposes.
Although the contested Royal Decree stated that it had been issued in accordance with European Regulation 2024/1028, the Supreme Court explains that this European regulation does not require the registration system to have nationwide scope and does not alter the internal distribution of powers of each EU member state.
What changes for tourist-property owners
According to a number of experts, the rule was annulled mainly because of the state’s encroachment on and overstepping of the powers of the autonomous communities, the duplication of registries and restrictions on the guarantee of market unity. Now no tourist-property owner will be required to obtain a unified registration number and, consequently, submit an annual rental declaration to the registry.
The unified registration number is an official identification code assigned to each property through the Unified Registry of Tourist and Seasonal Rentals, in which properties rented out for temporary or seasonal stays must be listed. The rule was announced last December in Royal Decree 1312/2024 and came into force in January, but became mandatory from 1 July 2025.
The European Commission’s position
Regardless of this Supreme Court ruling, in February 2026 the European Commission published a resolution prohibiting the double registration system for housing used for tourist purposes and setting 20 May as the deadline for eliminating any administrative duplication incompatible with EU law.
Ultimately, the Spanish Supreme Court’s decision is a breath of fresh air for those who firmly believe in the constitutional framework for the distribution of powers, as well as in reducing obstacles and state control over citizens’ lives and property.
