19 %, on the profit
| 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 | Issued by Skatteverket |
| Rental return | Annual, 1 to 20 April from the 2026 tax year |
Union membership puts you on the favourable side of Spanish law: loan interest, the owners' association charges, the Spanish local property tax, insurance, repairs, letting commission, the utilities you bear and a depreciation allowance on the building all reduce the base, in the proportion the days let bear to the year.
Here is the expectation that has to go. Swedish law, when a private home is let, allows a generous standard deduction that removes most small lettings from tax altogether and removes the need to itemise anything. Spain offers no equivalent. There is no standard allowance, no threshold below which a letting is ignored, and no substitute for invoices. Every euro of rent is declared and every euro of cost has to be evidenced and tied to a date. A Swedish owner who lets a flat for six weeks and assumes the Swedish arithmetic travels with them will file a Spanish return that is simply wrong.
Two charges, one flat
- Rental income, one return per property and per owner, filed once for the whole year. The 2024 and 2025 years fell between 1 and 20 January; from the 2026 year the window moves to 1 to 20 April of the following year, under Order HAC/623/2026.
- Imputed income for every day the property was at your disposal, at 1.1 % of the rateable value where that value has been revised in the last ten years and 2 % where it has not, apportioned by share and by days, under period code 0A.
That second charge is the other expectation that has to go. A great many Swedish owners keep a place on the coast purely for their own use and have never had a tenant in it. They still have an annual Spanish return to file, because the tax attaches to the property being available to them. And there is no joint filing: two names on the deed produce two of everything, every year.
Your Skatteverket certificate
The 19 % rate and the double taxation convention between Spain and Sweden, which has been in force since the second half of the 1970s, both depend on a current certificate of residence from Skatteverket, which Spain accepts for one year from its date. Ask for the calendar year that matches the Spanish return, which is easy because both countries use the calendar year, and keep the expired ones: a Spanish question about an old year is answered by that year's certificate.
What happens on the Swedish return
Sweden taxes residents on worldwide income, so the Spanish rent is declared at home as well and relief is given for the Spanish tax against the Swedish tax on the same income. Two consequences worth carrying into the conversation with your own adviser.
First, the relief is capped at the Swedish tax on that income. Because Swedish rules on letting a private home are, as described above, considerably more generous than the Spanish ones, the Swedish tax on a modest letting can be small or nil while the Spanish tax on the same letting is not. Where that happens, the Spanish tax is not fully recovered, and the shortfall is a real cost rather than a paperwork problem.
Second, Sweden no longer levies a net wealth tax, but Spain does levy its own wealth-type charge on property held here by non-residents, with its own thresholds and valuation rules. Swedish owners of higher-value coastal property sometimes meet a Spanish charge that has no Swedish counterpart at all, and it is worth checking where you stand rather than assuming the question does not arise. See the Spanish wealth tax.
We are Spanish lawyers and we advise on Spanish law. What is written above about Swedish deductions and Swedish relief is orientation so that you know where the mismatch lies. Keep your own adviser at home; we will supply the Spanish figures, dated and receipted.
The mistakes
- Carrying the Swedish standard deduction into the Spanish return. It does not exist here.
- Filing nothing because the letting was small. Spain has no de minimis.
- Filing nothing because there was no letting at all. Imputed income still applies.
- A full year of costs against a short season. The apportionment is compulsory.
- One return for two owners. Spain files by owner.
- Assuming the 3 % withheld on a sale is the final tax. It is a payment on account.
The platforms now report you
There is one more reason the days-let figure has to be right, and it is recent. Letting platforms operating in the European Union are obliged to collect and report details of the people who let accommodation through them — identity, addresses, the number of days let, the amounts paid — and that information is exchanged between the tax administrations of the Member States. A Swedish owner letting a flat in Spain through a platform is therefore visible to the Spanish authorities whether or not a return is ever filed, and visible with dates and figures rather than as a vague suspicion.
That changes the calculation for anyone who has been letting quietly. It also means the number you put on the Spanish return should be the number the platform reported, and where the two differ you should know why before somebody asks. Separately, short-term tourist letting in Spain is regulated at regional level and generally requires a registration before the property can lawfully be advertised; that is a licensing question rather than a tax one, but the two now feed each other. Our note on tourist rentals covers the ground.
What we do with Sweden
We register each property and each owner, take the rateable values, count the nights let from your statements, apportion the costs, prepare each return and send you the figures before anything is filed. We track your certificate. Correspondence is in English or Spanish, and the fee is a fixed monthly sum published on the pricing page. If you have never filed at all, say so — coming forward voluntarily costs a surcharge, while waiting for the letter costs a penalty, and the difference is large. Tell us about the property. The general rules are in our guides to non-resident property tax and form 210.
Sixty and forty: unmarried couples and the shares on the deed
Few foreign communities have been on the Costa del Sol as long as the Swedes, with schools, churches and associations in Fuengirola, Marbella, Nerja and Torremolinos, and further groups in Torrevieja and southern Gran Canaria. Swedes use the Spanish home exactly when Spaniards do not want it, from November to March, and let it in July and August when local demand peaks. Many Swedish couples are not married and buy in shares that reflect what each put in: 60 and 40, 70 and 30. In Spain those deed percentages govern Modelo 210, even if all the rent lands in one account.
Fuengirola, 2026: Erik and Anna
An unmarried couple resident in Uppsala, they bought an apartment for 260,000 €, Erik with 60 % and Anna with 40 %. The building is 60 % of the price, 156,000 €. In 2026 they use it from January to March and in December, and let it in July and August, 62 nights, for 9,000 €. A local firm handles keys and cleaning for 1,350 €, deducted in full. Year-round costs are IBI 520 €, community 960 €, insurance 230 €, utilities 1,450 € and depreciation 4,680 €: 7,840 €, of which the part matching 62 let days is 1,331.73 €.
| Line | Whole flat | Erik (60 %) | Anna (40 %) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Income | 9,000.00 € | 5,400.00 € | 3,600.00 € |
| Deductible costs | 2,681.73 € | 1,609.04 € | 1,072.69 € |
| Net rent | 6,318.27 € | 3,790.96 € | 2,527.31 € |
| Rental return at 19 % | 1,200.47 € | 720.28 € | 480.19 € |
| Imputed income (125,000 × 1.1 % × 303/365) | 1,141.44 € | 684.86 € | 456.58 € |
| Imputed income return at 19 % | 216.87 € | 130.12 € | 86.75 € |
Four returns, two each, and 1,417.34 € in total for the year. With only 62 days let, barely 17 % of the year-round costs are deductible, and the rest of the year, including the winter when the flat is full of life, is taxed as imputed income. Let in spring or autumn as well and the proportion rises while the imputed income falls.
Where the owners spend the winter, most of the electricity and water is used while they are there. Even so, some put the whole year's electricity bill into the rental return, or invent a split «by consumption». The Spanish rule is apportionment by days let over the whole year, applied as it stands. The other typical error in this profile is splitting 50/50 what the deed says is 60/40: easy to do, and easy to detect, because the tax authority has the deed.
One joint account, two returns, and shares that cannot just be changed
Who pays a bill is irrelevant: if Erik pays the whole insurance from his account, 60 % still goes on his return and 40 % on Anna's. What does have consequences is changing the shares. If Anna buys 10 % from Erik to reach 50/50, or he gives her a share for nothing, that is a transfer in Spain with its own taxes — a sale or a gift — and possibly a capital gain for whoever transfers. It needs a notary and the land registry, not simply 50/50 returns from next year. The same happens when a couple separates and one keeps the other's share. And since an unmarried partner's position on death depends on the law governing the succession and on the will, it is worth knowing the answer in advance; see inheritance and gift tax.