I doubt by doing that it would be affordable for those who can't afford it today. Many people don't rely on rental income from short-term rentals and only see it as a bonus, it still wouldn't stop people buying holiday homes and you can't easily change EU laws. Instead of the British couple renting out their property, it will be bought by a Dutch couple who use it from October to March.

I'm going to partly disagree with you.
The flat below ours is rented in the summer months (which is June to end September) and the lady who owns it could get less than €400 a month if rented long term.
In august she rents the three bed flat for €800 a week and last year it was occupied all of July and August at that cost. Those eight or so weeks alone gave her almost the same income that a whole year would.
Her family use the place early in the year and they are here now. I know this because they move furniture at ungodly hours and never pick things up but scrape them across the floor.
She has a deal with a cycle club in Belguim and they rent it for the two months of April and May (she does them a deal and only charges €300 a week for six people) I rent them my storeroom downstairs to keep their bikes in and thats worth a hundred a month to me and I throw in the parking space for free.

Maybe in some parts of the country its better for long term, but wherever you get decent numbers of tourists it will always be better to rent for the summer.
The other week Benidorm announced a 93% oppupancy rate at the begining of Feb.

Rentals are no business of the EU as far as I can see. Each country can set what accomodatiion rules they like. Prove me wrong and I will retract the comment.

Oh I think the results would be to the contrary. And none of this comes under the scope of EU law as this is entirely a local matter so only national/regional jurisdiction applies.

I would put in place a system to dissuade the residential property market from being used as an investment vehicle. This might have been viable up until recently but the situation has changed. Globally. Personally I would protect single-home ownership at all costs whilst at the same time doing everything possible to make it very, very, uneconomical to own multiple properties. I wouldn't block it, but I would make it very, very expensive to do so.

We can toy around with the numbers all we like, but just for argument's sake let's throw around several ideas:
- ban on short-term lets, 12-month min. contracts
- 0% property tax on property used as primary place of residence
- 10% annual property tax on 2nd property (or on 1st property if not used as primary place of residence - there goes your Dutch couple vacationing from October to March unless fully resident in Spain)
- 15% annual property tax on 3rd property
- 20% annual property tax on 4rd and subsequent properties
- 20% annual property tax on all properties owned by corporations, domestic or foreign

No hiding and cut the residential property market from being used for investment purposes. Completely. New times ahead. Pump money elsewhere, in fact anywhere else than properties. This is a vital commodity and everything should be done solely to support single-home ownership.

In relation to EU, I wasn't talking about renting and just mean people can buy without restrictions. It's just fact that Spain remains the go to destination for EU sunseekers and that won't change anytime soon unless the whole system or climate collapses. While people buy as an investment in Singapore, people buy in Spain for lifestyle and it's a completely different market.

With more and more retirees entering the market they will buy them for personal use rather than renting out and B&Bs were around long before the internet. All that happens is that new platforms are popping up and instead of renting out, you stay with friends free of charge and the visitor then gives a donation. We already see that it hasn't worked in Catalonia and hotel prices, house prices have actually increased with even fewer rentals available, that has again increased rental prices in other areas.



But speaking about EU, also interesting:
European Holiday Home Association (EHHA)submitted complaint to European Commission about unjustified and disproportionate Catalan short-term rental accommodation rules.

In the EU, any national, regional or local rules which aim to impose restrictions on the provision of the short-term rental services, must comply with the EU law and more specifically the Services Directive. The Services Directive clarifies that any such rules must behashtag#justified,hashtag#nondiscriminatoryandhashtag#proportionate.

EHHA highlights that politically inflamed accusations that short-term rentals impact availability and affordability of housing and contribute to over-tourism is too one-dimensional in a multi-faceted and overly complex discussion.

STRs should not be seen as an easy scapegoat for excessively restrictive rules which are based on assumptions.

We are convinced that EU law has not been respected. By submitting the EU complaint, we hope that the European Commission will take a step further and open a formal infringement procedure against Spain.

Again, we urge the new Catalan government to review the concerns raised by the European Commission earlier and act diligently and with urgency to suppress the unfair and disproportionate provisions of the law.