19 %, and expenses come off
| Item | Your position |
|---|---|
| Non-resident income tax rate | 19 % |
| Inside the EU, Iceland, Norway or Liechtenstein? | Yes |
| Costs deductible against rent? | Yes, apportioned to the days actually let |
| Residence certificate | Certificate of tax residence issued by ANAF |
| Rental return | Annual, 1 to 20 April from the 2026 tax year |
Because Romania is a Member State you keep the favourable treatment: loan interest, the charges of the owners' association, the local property tax, insurance, repairs, letting commission, the utilities you bear and a depreciation allowance on the building all reduce the base before the rate applies, restricted to the proportion of the year the flat was genuinely let.
While you lived in Spain, the flat was declared on your Spanish resident income tax return, along with everything else, and if you lived in it there was often nothing to declare at all. The moment you cease to be resident here, the picture inverts. The property now generates its own annual filings, independently of your income anywhere: a rental return if it is let, and an imputed income return for every day it is not. Nobody sends a notice when this happens. It follows from the move, and the first sign of trouble is usually a letter some years later addressed to an old Spanish address.
What you now have to file
- Rental income, one return for each property and each owner, gathered into one annual filing. The 2024 and 2025 years fell between 1 and 20 January; from the 2026 year the window is 1 to 20 April of the following year, under Order HAC/623/2026.
- Imputed income for the days the property was at your disposal, at 1.1 % of the rateable value where it was revised within the last ten years and 2 % where it was not, apportioned by share and by days, under period code 0A. If a relative uses the flat without paying rent, or it simply sits empty, this is the charge that applies.
Spain files by owner. If the flat is in two names, there are two of each return every year. And keeping a Spanish address on the deeds does not make you a resident: residence is a question of fact, decided by where you actually live and where your economic interests are.
Your ANAF certificate
To be taxed at 19 % and to rely on the double taxation convention between Spain and Romania, you need a current certificate of tax residence from ANAF, which Spain accepts for one year from its date. The convention between the two countries is long-standing and has been renegotiated in recent years, so if anything beyond ordinary letting is in play — a pension, employment income, a sale — the version applicable to your year is worth confirming with a Romanian adviser rather than assuming.
What happens on the Romanian return
Romania taxes its residents on worldwide income, and income obtained abroad is reported through the single annual return that Romanian individuals file, with relief for the tax paid abroad on the same income. As everywhere, the relief is limited to the Romanian tax attributable to that income, and the two taxable figures will not coincide, because the Spanish apportionment of costs to days let has no Romanian equivalent.
There is a further point that matters for people who moved back recently. Reacquiring Romanian tax residence and ceasing Spanish tax residence are two separate questions with two separate procedures, and a year in which both countries consider you resident is a year that has to be resolved under the convention rather than by choosing. If you left Spain in the middle of a year, or if you still spend long periods here, get that settled before filing anything, because every other answer depends on it.
We are Spanish lawyers and our advice covers Spanish law. What is said above about ANAF and about the Romanian return is orientation so that you know what to raise. Keep an adviser in Romania; we will provide the Spanish figures, dated and receipted.
What goes wrong with Romania
- Not realising the obligation exists. By far the commonest problem on this page, and the one that compounds year after year.
- An old Spanish address on the file. Letters go there, are never read, and deadlines pass without anyone knowing.
- Filing nothing because a family member lives in the flat rent-free. Imputed income applies to the owner regardless.
- One return for two owners. Spain files by owner.
- Deducting a full year of costs against a short letting season.
- Selling and forgetting the 3 %. It is a payment on account and often exceeds the tax due, but the surplus has to be claimed.
Two housekeeping items that decide everything else
Your Spanish identification number stays with you. The number you were given while living here does not lapse when you leave, and it is how the Spanish system knows the property is yours. If you never had one, or the one on the deed is wrong or out of date, that is the first thing to fix, because every return, every payment and every certificate hangs off it.
Somebody has to receive the post. This is where returnee owners come unstuck. The Spanish authorities notify to the address they hold, and if that is a flat you no longer live in, or a neighbour who has moved, the notification is still valid and the clock still runs. Appointing a representative in Spain to receive communications closes that gap, and for an owner living abroad it is the difference between answering a routine query in time and discovering an enforced collection procedure two years later. We act as that point of contact for our clients as a matter of course, which is why our files do not produce those letters.
Our method with Romania
We register each property and each owner, take the rateable values, count the nights let, prepare every return and send you the figures before filing. If years have gone unfiled, say so: coming forward voluntarily carries a surcharge, waiting for the letter carries a penalty, and the difference runs into thousands — see filing late. Correspondence is in English or Spanish and the fee is fixed, on the pricing page; or tell us about the property. The general rules are in our guides to non-resident property tax and form 210.
Going home and keeping the flat in Spain
Most Romanian residents with a home in Spain did not buy it from abroad. They came to work in construction, agriculture, hospitality or care, stayed a decade or two, paid off a mortgage and, when they went back, kept the flat. Some let it to a family on a long contract; some leave it to a brother or a son who stayed; some keep it shut for the holidays. While you lived here the flat sat in your Spanish income tax return, and if it was your home there was nothing to declare for it. Once you stop being resident it acquires a tax life of its own, and no office writes to tell you. Spain does not split the year either: if you spent more than 183 days here in the year you left, you remain resident for that year, and the first Modelo 210 normally belongs to the first full year in Romania.
Mihai's flat in Castellón, let to a family
Mihai returned to Iași at the end of 2024 and in 2026 spent only a few days in Spain. His flat in Castellón, which he owns alone, is let for the whole twelve months at 650 € a month. The year's costs are 310 € of IBI, 540 € of community charges, 180 € of insurance, 1,650 € of interest on the remaining mortgage and 420 € for a plumbing repair. The building is worth 60,000 €, so depreciation at 3 % is 1,800 €.
| Castellón flat | 2026 |
|---|---|
| Rent collected (12 × 650 €) | 7,800.00 € |
| Mortgage interest | − 1,650.00 € |
| IBI, community and insurance | − 1,030.00 € |
| Repair | − 420.00 € |
| Depreciation | − 1,800.00 € |
| Taxable base | 2,900.00 € |
| Tax at 19 % | 551.00 € |
Let every day of the year, so no apportionment and no imputed income: a single rental return. Had his sister lived there rent-free, there would be no rent to declare but imputed income on the rateable value for the whole year, because a flat lent free to a relative remains at the owner's disposal. And the reduction for letting a home that Mihai may remember from his resident years does not exist for non-residents; people who used to apply it notice on the first return.
Very often the relative living in the flat hands over a monthly sum towards the mortgage, with no contract and nobody calling it rent. For the tax authority, a regular payment for using the home is most likely rent and must be declared as such. Better to put it in writing and declare it than to explain it later in a review.
If one of you stayed in Spain
Sometimes only one spouse goes back and the other keeps living and working in Spain. Each then declares their half of the flat under a different tax: the one who stayed, in their resident income tax return; the one who left, through Modelo 210. Two returns with different rules for the same property, whose figures for income and costs should agree. The same applies to a separated couple living in different countries. Remember, too, to give the tax authority your new address in Romania; otherwise notifications keep going to a Spanish address where nobody lives, or to the letterbox of the let flat.