They add up, you do not pick one
Nobody buys "a service": they buy knowing their obligations are covered. If you own a holiday let and also invoice clients abroad, both apply to you, and the fee is worked out once over your whole case. That is why the form asks what it asks — so as not to undersell you, or overcharge you.
The recurring lines
These are the ones with a calendar: something is due every quarter, or every year, whether or not anything happened.
- Holiday lets. The reverse-charge VAT on platform commissions today, the 10 % VAT on stays of up to 30 nights when it comes in (start date uncertain, outer limit July 2028), and tax on the rental income either way. The nights actually let drive how costs are apportioned.
- Self-employed. Forms 130 and 303 each quarter, the 390 in January, and 111 and 115 once you have staff or premises.
- Invoicing abroad. Where each service is taxed, the ROI register, form 349 and the one-stop shop.
- Non-resident property. One form 210 per property and per owner: rental income annually, and imputed income for the days it stood at your disposal.
- Pensions paid abroad. Which country taxes your Spanish pension under the treaty, and how to recover what was over-withheld.
- The Beckham regime. Article 93: forms 149 and 151, the 24 % up to 600,000 €, and what the regime does not shelter.
- Assets abroad, form 720. Three blocks of 50,000 €, the increase rule and the history you have to keep.
- Wealth tax. Form 714: the exempt threshold, the duty to file above two million, and how non-residents are treated.
The one-off lines
These have no calendar. Their clock starts with an event: a deed, a death, a letter, a sale.
- Inheritance and gifts. Six months to settle, the region whose rules apply, and the jump between groups that multiplies the bill.
- Filing late. Come forward yourself and it is a surcharge. Wait for their letter and it is a penalty. The difference is thousands of euros.
- Paying in instalments. Spreading what you owe without a guarantee up to the legal threshold, and without going into enforcement.
- A letter from the tax office. Requests, proposed assessments and reviews: what gets answered, what gets submitted, and how long you really have.
- Certificate of tax residence. The document that decides which country taxes you and at what rate. 150 €.
- I sold a property. The 3 % withheld is a payment on account, not the tax. We work out the real gain and claim the difference back.
- The 3 % on a purchase. Buy from a non-resident and that 3 % is yours to pay in within a month. If you do not, the property answers for it.
- Municipal capital gains. Two calculation methods, and you pay the lower. Sell without a gain in the land value and there is nothing to pay.
- Share plans. Spain has no law on equity compensation: there is a US contract and an income tax that never had it in mind. We read both.
- Reinvesting in a new home. Sell your main home and buy another and the gain can be exempt. Two years, and four conditions you must be able to prove.
- Registering as self-employed. Form 036 and the RETA on the same day, with the right activity codes and the flat rate if you qualify.
- Benefit plus self-employment. Three ways of combining unemployment benefit with working for yourself, all applied for before you start.
How the fee is worked out
The recurring lines are priced monthly or annually, and the one-off ones at a fixed price agreed before anything starts. What moves the monthly figure is not what you earn: it is how much there is to record. A freelancer with one client a month and one with forty invoices a month pay differently, because the work is different.
| Shape of the work | How it is priced |
|---|---|
| Recurring, with a calendar | A monthly or annual fee, no minimum term, with every return your case requires included |
| One-off, triggered by an event | A fixed price, quoted in writing before we start |
| Several lines at once | Worked out once over your whole case, not added up line by line |
| Back years to catch up | Quoted separately, after an inventory, and dealt with before the current work |
What we do not do
We act for individuals, not companies: no corporation tax, no statutory accounts, no commercial bookkeeping. We do not handle the sale of physical goods, with its stock, customs and one-stop shop. And we do not advise on the law of another country — we read a foreign contract to understand what rights it gives you, but the tax treatment abroad belongs to a professional there, and we coordinate with them.
Saying this plainly at the start saves everyone a conversation later.
What most clients actually look like
Very few people fit one line cleanly. These are the combinations we see week after week, and they are worth recognising because each one has an interaction that is easy to miss.
| The situation | The lines it touches | What people miss |
|---|---|---|
| A British couple with a flat on the coast, let in summer | Holiday lets, non-resident property | Two owners means two sets of returns, and the empty days are taxed as well as the let ones |
| A developer in Valencia invoicing a US company | Self-employed, invoicing abroad, share plans | The equity from the US parent is a separate problem from the invoicing, and it has its own deadlines |
| Someone who arrived last year on a remote-work visa | The Beckham regime, assets abroad, wealth tax | Six months to elect for the regime, and the reporting duties on what they left behind |
| A retired teacher in Portugal with a Spanish pension | Pensions paid abroad, non-resident property | Whether the pension is a government one decides which country taxes it |
| An heir abroad with a flat in Andalucía | Inheritance, municipal capital gains, non-resident property | Six months for the tax, thirty working days for the town hall, and the clock started at the death |
None of that requires you to work out which lines are yours before writing to us. That is what the questionnaire is for.
What we need from you, and how often
For the recurring lines, your documents as they reach you. Each client has a folder of their own in Google Drive: you drag in the statement or the invoice on the day it arrives, and the system picks up whatever is new every day. Anyone who prefers email can forward the documents instead. If we are the ones who ask for something again — an illegible scan, a format we cannot read — that does not count against you.
For the one-off lines, there is a list of documents specific to the matter, and we send it the day you instruct us. The folder is there for those too, so nothing has to be kept back until the end.
When something stops being routine
Most of what we do is predictable: the same forms, the same deadlines, done properly. But part of it is not, and the difference matters. A letter from the tax office, an inheritance with assets in two countries, a share plan drafted in English under US law — those are legal questions, not data-entry ones, and a lawyer looks at them.
That is the reason this is a law firm and not a bookkeeping service, and the reason we say plainly when something is arguable instead of presenting it as settled.
How to know which ones are yours
The quickest way is the two-minute questionnaire: it asks about your situation, not about our services, and it ends by telling you which forms apply, on what deadlines, and what it would cost for us to handle them. Nothing is committed by filling it in.