Your rental rights in Spain (and what to look out for)

Earlier this January we had an issue come up with our landlord. We were 7 months into our rental contract and suddenly noticed that he wasn’t as friendly as he used to be. Something was off and we were suspicious. So I asked him point blank “Our contract ends on May 31st and we’d be interested in renewing. Are you still looking to renew or do you have other plans?”

It took him 5 days to respond and when he did it was with bad news “We would like the apartment back because my son will use it. So we will not be renewing the contract”.

It was December 31^st when we received that news. After the issues we had finding an apartment last year, and knowing that Granada has a difficult rental market, we decided to start looking for a new apartment right away.

On January 3^rd we found an interesting apartment on Idealista. I wrote the owner. We went and visited the very same day and really liked the apartment.

That same day I wrote back our landlord “We’ve found an apartment we like. Considering your wish not to renew and considering the difficult rental market, would you allow us to break our current contract without penalty? And would you allow us less than the 30-day required pre-advice to terminate the contract?”

It took about 30 minutes for the landlord to get back to me: “We want to terminate the contract on May 31^st when the contract period ends. If it ends before you will have to continue paying rent until the end of the contract. However we can resolve this by renewing the contract until May 31, 2026”.

So in the end, we got what we wanted in the first place: that is to renew the rental contract for one more year.

But the above brings up quite a few questions and issues that foreigners coming to Spain may not be familiar with. Principally: when can a landlord terminate a rental contract? And how much advance notice does he have to give you? Conversely, can you (the tenant) terminate the contract? If so when and at what cost?

I’m going to be writing about that (and more having to do with rental contracts) in this post. I’ll also give you some tips at the end because, as I found out, the landlord had some non-standard clauses in the lease which I should have known about before signing. People should know what to look out for.

PS: Many thanks to Maria Louisa Castro from CostaLuz Lawyers for helping me on this post. She clarified a few laws for me, pointed out an abusive clause in the contract, and gave me some advice on things you should do before signing a rental contract. I’ll cover all that below.

Types of Rental Contracts in Spain

In Spain there are two types of rental contracts, the difference being the duration of the contract.

The first is a Short-term contract (Arrendamiento para Uso Distinto de Vivienda) which are for a period of up to 1 year and which are not extendable. They are usually used for seasonal rentals, student housing, office spaces, and commercial leases. They do not benefit from tenant protections under the LAU (Ley de Arrendamientos Urbanos ie Urban Leases Act) and terms are freely negotiated between the parties. I’m not going to talk about this kind of contract here, it doesn’t apply to most expats looking to settle in Spain. Just know one thing: Some landlords misclassify leases as Uso Distinto de Vivienda to avoid tenant protections (you may have heard about 11 month leases which aim to do just that). However, if a tenant uses the property as their primary residence, they can legally challenge the contract’s classification and claim the rights granted under the LAU.

The second is a long-term contract (Arrienda de Vivienda, or as ours is written “Contrato de Arrendamiento de Vivienda”). These contracts are usually set for 12 months but can be extended if the tenant and landlord agree to do so. These are the contracts that most foreigners coming to Spain will be signing. It’s these long-term contracts/leases (I’ll be using these terms interchangeably below) that I will be addressing below.

Long-term rental contracts in Spain and your rights

I’ve mentioned above that most long-term rental contracts are set for 12 months but that they can be extended past that. In fact, the law states that a contract of less than 5 years will be extended annually until the lease reaches a minimum duration of five years (seven years if the lessor is a legal entity). This is unless both parties agree to terminate the contract early.

In other words, you have the right to rent the property for up to 5 years without the landlord being able to kick you out.

The conditional above being that you don’t break the terms of the contract by not paying your rent, not using the property for its intended use, doing harmful or illegal activities or by subletting.

However, there are a couple of things to look out for

The landlord can claim the accommodation for his use (for themselves or their relatives). They can only exercise this claim after year 1 of the agreement and must give you, the tenant, 2 months’ notice. Furthermore: The landlord must have stated this in the tenancy agreement.

Note : this clause (below) is exactly what was used by our landlord as an excuse to get us out. It is stated as a clause in our contract so he does have that right. So in our case, he could have advised us of that when the contract expired (May 31^st) and we would have had 2 months to find something else and vacate the apartment.

Above is the clause in our contract. You as a tenant, should look out for it. Without it, the landlord does not have the right to terminate your contract for the reason of claiming the apartment for personal use.

Note 2: According to the law, the landlord has to take possession of the apartment within 3 months if he’s reclaimed the apartment from you…if he/she doesn’t, you as a tenant have a right to moved back into the apartment with the same terms and conditions as previously written in the contract (this clause is interesting in theory but not sure how it would actually work in practice).

2. The other time that a landlord can terminate a lease is coming up to the end of year 5 of your contract. At that time your landlord can advise you – 4 months prior to the termination of your contract – that he will not renew your lease upon termination. If he gives you that notice, you have 4 months to vacate the apartment. You can also terminate the contract by giving him 2 months notice.

IF you or your landlord don’t give advice to terminate the contract, the lease is automatically extended for another 3 years and again, unless you break the terms of the contact, the landlord can’t evict you.

The above two situations are where a landlord can terminate your lease/contract. Otherwise, unless you break the contract (by not paying rent and all the other conditions I’ve mentioned above) you have the legal right to maintain the apartment without getting kicked out.

Can you (the Tenant) terminate the lease?

Yes you can.

The general rule is that as long as you’ve fulfilled 6 months of your contract, you can terminate the remaining term of your contract if you give the landlord a minimum of 30 days notice.

Usually, landlords include a clause asking for 1 month’s rent for every year of the remaining contract if you terminate your contract. If your contract is shorter than a year, you may have to pay rent in proportion to the remaining time left. So if you’re terminating a lease with 6 months remaining on the contract, you should in theory have to pay a penalty of half of a month’s rent*.

*We lived 2 ½ years in Nerja. On the 3^rd year, we terminated the lease halfway through, giving the landlord 30 days notice. We had a clause such as the above (we would have had to pay half a month’s rent) but the landlord was generous and waived it. We left the apartment 6 months early and didn’t pay any penalty.

Note: If there’s no clause for compensation/penalty, you don’t have to pay any compensation for terminating early.

What if your contract has a clause stating that you cannot terminate the lease after you’ve fulfilled 6 months of your contract?

We had that clause in our contract and it is the reason our landlord told us that “you will have to continue paying rent until the end of the contract”. This is an abusive clause and may be considered null if taken to court (more on that further below).

Look out for any clause that tells you that you cannot terminate the lease after 6 months or that you have to continue paying rent to the end of your lease term even if you leave the premises.

Inspect and document the apartment before moving in

It’s something we weren’t really aware of and, so far, haven’t had issues with. But it can be.

You should always inspect the apartment before moving in. Write down any deficiencies in furniture, appliances, windows, doors etc. Take photos. And advise the landlord in writing about anything you spot.

The reason is that you don’t want to be held responsible for any damages that were already there before you moved in.

On the other side of the coin, be attentive to inventory or photos that the landlord may want you to sign. It’s happened in the last 2 apartments we’ve moved into: landlords who’ve listed and taken photos of every item that was included in the apartment and then asked that we sign off on them. Again, just make sure everything is and appears as stated.

As I say, we haven’t had any issues yet but have heard stories of landlords using “damages” as a reason not to pay deposits back to a tenant.

The Deposit

You’ll always be asked to pay a deposit (a fianza) before moving into an apartment. It’s meant to be a protection in case a tenant doesn’t pay rent or as insurance against damages.

In most cases you’ll be asked for a 1 month deposit. In some cases, you might be asked for a 2 month deposit (we had pay 2 months when we moved to Antequera). Legally, a deposit should not be more than 2 months of rent.

You should never pay the deposit in cash, always better to transfer the amount so that you have a paper trail.

Most Spanish regions (including Andalusia) require landlords to register deposits with a designated authority and tenants should request proof of payment.

The deposit should be paid back to the tenant 1 month after they move out and there might be deductions for outstanding invoices paid by the landlord. If there are damages, the landlord may deduct further amounts*.

*you should ask the landlord to inspect the apartment before you move out to clear up any disagreements over damages.

Obligations of the Tenant

You should restore the apartment to its previous condition so if you’ve painted it, put up shelves etc. It’s often a clause in the lease.

You might have to advise the landlord if you have people staying in your apartment that are not immediate family.

Avise the landlord of any damages to the property.

Follow the terms of the contract as previously stated:

Pay your rent

Use the property for its intended use

Don’t do harmful or illegal activities

Don’t sublet.

Obligations of the landlord

Carry out necessary repairs to the elements that came with the apartment (appliances, plumbing, electricity, windows, doors etc)

Inform tenants of rent increases (which should be according to the Consumer Price Index (CPI) and should be announced to the tenant 1 month prior to the renewing of the lease).

Pay back the deposit

Landlords can’t enter the premises without notice or permission

They can’t sell the apartment during your tenancy or use selling as a reason to kick you out.

Our experience with landlords

Prior to this apartment experience we had pretty relaxed landlords who followed standard contracts (one admitted to just printing out a contract from the Idealista website).

Our landlords in Granada were different and put some clauses into the contract that protected them

As you saw above, they had the clause in the contract about claiming the accommodation for their own use. That clause would have had them terminating the contract at the end of the first year of the lease, giving us 2 months notice to move out. Note: everyone knows that landlords use this clause when they want to sell the apartment.

I’ve mentioned that the general rule is that as long as you’ve fulfilled 6 months of your contract, you can terminate the remaining term of your contract if you give the landlord a minimum of 30 days notice. You’ll usually have to pay compensation equivalent to 1 month’s rent for every year remaining on your contract.

But in our case they inserted a clause on the first page stipulating that “the first year is mandatory and that payment is mandatory”. As mentioned above, that is an abusive clause that would most likely be considered null if taken to court.

So they protected themselves: a) they would collect all payments to the end of the contract (May 31) while b) waiting until that day (May 31) to give us notice that they would kick us out. If we hadn’t been suspicious of their intentions we would have been stuck in a tight situation, having 2 months to find an apartment in the height of summer. As much as we understand them needing to protect their interests, we also feel they were a bit devious and dishonest about their intentions.

Advice to prevent unforeseen issues

We were in a pretty desperate situation trying to find an apartment last year (as I wrote about here) so we probably wouldn’t have done anything differently. Still, here is what people should do:

1. Get the real estate agent to send you the provisional contract before you sign it. Go over it in detail, get it translated (easy with Google Translate). In our case, the landlords had their own real estate agent and they read me the contract in the office. Some of it went over my head. That wouldn’t have happened if I had time to read it for myself.

2. Watch for unusual clauses like the ones I’ve mentioned above. Also have a look at this post: How to avoid abusive clauses in your Spanish property rental contract.

3. If you’re still unsure, consult with a lawyer. Just have them look at the contract for anything unusual. They know what is standard and they know what isn’t. As mentioned about, I wanted to be sure that I knew what I was writing about when writing this post so I contacted Maria Louisa Castro at CostaLuz Lawyers. Her email: [email protected]. She gave lots of information as well as specific advice pertaining to our case.

In the end, I think our situation is resolved. The bottom line is that we wanted to stay in this apartment another year… we’ve agreed to renew the contract for another year which is what we wanted all along.

Having said the above, I’d recommend that would-be renters be a bit less trusting and more informed than we were. Being more familiar with the rental laws and standard contract clauses would have helped us avoid the issues we experienced. Hopefully you can learn from our mistakes.

A few useful Resources

Private health insurance in Spain. We recommend Innoinsure, they make it easy. And you don’t need a Spanish bank account – you can pay with foreign credit cards. More info here.

Spartan FX. Buying a house or car in Spain and need to transfer and exchange a large sum of money? More here.

Wise. For everyday transfers and exchanges of money from your home country. Nobody should be using banks anymore. More here.