One Modelo 210 per property and per owner
The rule that most surprises someone who has just inherited a house in Cadaqués or Begur is that Modelo 210 is not an annual return by the owner but a return per property and per owner. A married couple with two houses file four, not one. And it is filed even if the house stands empty all year: a non-resident who does not let still pays tax on imputed income, computed on the valor catastral.
If the house is let, what is declared is the profit, and the frequency of filing has changed over recent tax years. We do not set out a fixed calendar here: the order in force is checked before filing, because the way rental income is grouped has been modified and following the habit of a few years ago is now a source of errors. You have it in non-resident property owners.
Resident in France: the costs you may deduct
Here lies the difference that moves the most money. Article 24 of the Spanish non-resident income tax act allows those resident in the European Union or the European Economic Area to deduct, in arriving at the taxable base of rental income, the costs provided for by the personal income tax rules that are directly related to the income obtained. A resident of France may therefore subtract the IBI local property tax, community charges, insurance, interest, utilities borne by the owner and depreciation; a resident outside the European Economic Area, as a rule, may not.
The rate is set by article 25 of the same act, and it too is not the same for a resident of the Union as for someone from outside it. Those two rules combined lead to one practical conclusion: your status as a resident of France has to be provable, and it is proved with a tax residence certificate issued by the French authorities, not with an identity card or an electricity bill. It is in tax residence certificate.
The treaty between Spain and France allows Spain to tax income from property situated here, and it is then for France to relieve double taxation under its own rules. Declaring in Spain does not release you from declaring in France. We handle the Spanish side and coordinate with your French adviser: we have no network of foreign advisers and we would rather say so.
The day it is sold
When a non-resident sells property in Spain, the buyer is obliged to withhold and pay over 3 % of the price on account of the seller's tax, using Modelo 211. That withholding is not the tax: it is a payment on account. The seller must then declare the gain, and if the withholding exceeds what is due, a refund is claimed. On houses bought decades ago that 3 % usually falls short; on recently inherited ones, it usually overshoots.
And there is a second tax, a municipal one, that gets forgotten: the plusvalía on the increase in land value. It is settled with the town hall where the property lies, with two methods of calculation of which you pay the lower — but you have to choose it yourself. We handle it in I have sold a property in Spain.
Who writes to us from Girona
| Who | What they have to file |
|---|---|
| French couple with a house on the Costa Brava | One 210 per spouse and per property, with costs deductible because they are resident in the EU |
| French heir to a family house | Inheritance under Catalan competence and the value fixed for the future sale |
| Owner selling after thirty years | The 3 % withholding, the capital gain and the municipal plusvalía |
| A French national who has moved here | Tax residence acquired on moving and, if the move is for work, the deadline for Modelo 149 |
| Owner whose letting is run by an agency | Commissions, statements and which part of all that is a deductible cost |
Our way of working in Girona
In Spanish, English and French, and in writing, which with two tax administrations involved is the sensible way to leave a record. You send us the deed, the IBI receipt, the residence certificate and the agency statements, and we assemble the whole year. If there are unfiled years, we look at which ones are still open — the limitation period is four years — and they are put in order from the oldest forward.
Where the house is run by an agency we ask for the annual statements rather than the summary screen: commission, cleaning and platform fees are deductible only when they can be tied to an invoice and to the nights they relate to.
We do not guarantee results: we tell you what is solid, what is disputed and what we would do with your file in front of us.
A house in Begur let for eight weeks: the Modelo 210 numbers
A couple resident in France own a house in Begur in equal shares, bought in 1998 for 190,000 € including costs. Revised cadastral value 160,000 €, of which the land is 45 %. The agency lets it for eight weeks in summer, 56 nights, for 16,000 €, and keeps 20 %. The rest of the year they use it or it stays shut. Each spouse declares their half:
| Item | Total | Per spouse |
|---|---|---|
| Rent received | 16,000 € | 8,000 € |
| Agency commission, in full | −3,200 € | −1,600 € |
| IBI, estate fees, insurance, utilities and depreciation (6,885 €), × 56/365 | −1,056.33 € | −528.16 € |
| Net income | 11,743.67 € | 5,871.84 € |
| Non-resident income tax at 19 %, as EU residents | 1,115.65 € | |
| Imputed income for the other 309 days: 160,000 × 1.1 % × 309/365 | 1,489.97 € | 744.99 € |
| Non-resident tax on the imputed income, at 19 % | 141.55 € |
Depreciation is 3 % of the building part of the cost, 104,500 €. The imputed income is the Spanish rule that treats a second home as producing income simply by being available to its owner, even when nobody pays for it. If they lived outside the European Economic Area they could deduct no costs at all and the rate would be 24 %: each would pay 1,920 € on the rent instead of 1,115.65 €. And there are four returns, not one: a 210 for the rental income and another for the imputed income, for each spouse.
The agency statement usually arrives net, with the commission already taken off. The gross is declared and the commission as a cost: the result is the same, but the income figure has to match what the platforms and intermediaries report to the tax office, and a 210 declared on the net leaves a mismatch that ends in a letter.
When each 210 for the Girona house is filed
| Return | Deadline for 2026 |
|---|---|
| 210 for the letting, one per spouse | 1 to 20 April 2027; by the 15th if paid by direct debit |
| 210 for the imputed income, one per spouse | 1 April to 31 December 2027; by 23 December if paid by direct debit |
| French residence certificate | Have it before filing, because it is what supports the 19 % and the costs |
| Municipal plusvalía, IBI and refuse charge | Whatever the town hall sets, which does not depend on your living abroad |
The detail of the imputed income is in imputed income for non-residents, and if you want us to handle all four, tell us about the house in the non-resident form.
What almost nobody on the Costa Brava asks: many agencies take care of the 210 for the let weeks and consider the matter closed. The one for the imputed income over the rest of the year is filed by nobody, because there is no payment to act as a reminder. The sums are small, but they pile up per spouse and per year, and they are easy to detect. Put right on your own initiative, the surcharge is 1 % plus one point for each full month of delay; after twelve months, 15 % plus late-payment interest. That is still far below what comes out of a tax audit.