Imputed income on a second home in Spain: 2 % or 1.1 %, the 2012 window and the sliding scale Congress repealed

For a few days in the autumn of 2026 the tax on a second home in Spain had a new formula. On 30 September the Official State Gazette published Real Decreto-ley 26/2026, a housing decree whose sixth article did two things to the imputed income that the owner of a home that is not let declares every year: it kept the reduced 1.1 % alive for 2026 in towns whose cadastral values date from 2012 or later, and from 2027 it replaced the flat percentages with a sliding scale on the sum of the owner's cadastral values. On 2 October Congress voted on the decree and repealed it, by 178 votes to 172, and both changes fell with it.

Nothing an owner has to file changes today, and that is the first thing to know. The second is why the 1.1 % keeps appearing and disappearing: the same extension has now been voted down four times in less than two years. The third is what the scale would have done to a bill. What the same decree did to leases, and what its repeal leaves behind, is explained by our colleagues at Olga Caballero in their piece on the October decrees.

The tax on a home that earns nothing

Spain taxes a second home even when nobody pays to stay in it. For every urban property that is not the owner's main home, is not let and is not used in a business, the Income Tax Act treats as income la cantidad que resulte de aplicar el 2 por ciento al valor catastral, the amount that results from applying 2 per cent to the cadastral value, in proportion to the days of the year. A resident adds that figure to the yearly return. A non-resident pays tax on it through the Modelo 210, because the non-residents' law sends the calculation of la renta imputada de los bienes inmuebles situados en territorio español, the imputed income of real estate located in Spanish territory, to the same rule, and then applies its own rate to the result: 19 % for residents of another member state of the European Union or of the European Economic Area with which tax information is exchanged, and 24 % for everyone else, the United Kingdom included.

The tax accrues once a year, on 31 December. The return for 2025 can be filed until 31 December 2026. From the 2026 tax year the window opens later, on 1 April of the following year: the return for 2026 will be filed between 1 April and 31 December 2027, or until 23 December if it is paid by direct debit. Our guide to the Modelo 210 covers the form itself.

2 % or 1.1 %: the year your town was revalued

The same article lowers the percentage to 1.1 % for properties in municipalities whose cadastral values were revised in a general valuation and hayan entrado en vigor en el período impositivo o en el plazo de los diez períodos impositivos anteriores, have entered into force in the tax period or in the ten tax periods before it. For 2026 that means values in force since 2016.

On Fuerteventura the answer is almost always 2 %. The Catastro's register of valuation reports gives the year in which each municipality's current values came into force:

Elsewhere in the Canaries the 1.1 % reaches Adeje (2025), Guía de Isora (2018), Garafía and Puntallana (2022). Our piece on the IBI, the waste fee and the cadastral value explains where the value comes from and where to find yours.

The arithmetic is short. An apartment in Corralejo with a cadastral value of €60,000, used by its owners all year, has an imputed income of €1,200. A German or Dutch owner pays 19 % of that, €228; a British owner pays 24 %, €288. Two spouses who own it in halves file a return each, on €600. And if the apartment was let for part of the year, the imputation covers only the days it was not.

The 2012 window: four decrees, four votes

Besides the ten-year rule there is, since 2023, a temporary one that widens the window. The budget law for 2023 applied the 1.1 % for that year to municipalities whose revised values hubieran entrado en vigor a partir de 1 de enero de 2012, had entered into force from 1 January 2012. Since then it has been extended only by decree-law, and Congress has repealed every one of those decrees: the one of December 2024 in January 2025, the one of December 2025 in January 2026, the one of February 2026 three weeks later, and now the one of September 2026.

A repealed decree-law still counts for the days it was law. The first two were in force on 31 December, the day the tax accrues, and the tax agency's own pages apply the 2012 window En los períodos impositivos 2023, 2024 y 2025, in the tax periods 2023, 2024 and 2025. For 2026 no extension is in force as we write. Whether one will be on 31 December 2026 depends on the Government and on Congress, and Parliament was dissolved on 6 October 2026, with a general election called for 29 November. Each of the last two Decembers brought a decree.

On Fuerteventura none of this moves a euro: no municipality of the island has values that came into force between 2012 and 2015. In the Canaries the window matters in two towns, Agüimes (2012) and Breña Alta (2013).

The scale that was law for a few days

The decree's other change was structural. With effect from 1 January 2027 it replaced the two flat percentages with a scale applied to la suma de los valores catastrales de los inmuebles, the sum of the cadastral values of the properties: every built property the owner holds that is not the main home, is not let and is not used in a business.

For the owner of one modest apartment in a town on the 2 % it was a cut of almost half: the Corralejo flat of €60,000 would have gone from €1,200 of imputed income to €660, and its tax from €228 to €125.40 at 19 %, or from €288 to €158.40 at 24 %. For an owner in a town that already has the 1.1 % it was a rise as soon as the sum passed €100,000: a villa in Adeje valued at €300,000 would have gone from €3,300 to €4,100. And the scale only overtook the flat 2 % above €1,290,000.

The text left two questions open that no longer need an answer: whether co-owners entered the scale with the whole value or with their share, and how a return filed property by property, as the Modelo 210 is, would have added the values up.

What to do now

• File 2025 as planned. The return for 2025 is due by 31 December 2026, at the percentage of the table above, which is the same for 2025.
• Do not use the scale. It never applied to any tax year: it was to start with 2027 and was repealed in 2026.
• Check the percentage again in January. The return for 2026 opens on 1 April 2027; what counts is the law in force on 31 December 2026.
• Keep the cadastral value at hand. It is on the IBI receipt, and it is the only figure in the calculation that is yours to check.

Our Caleta de Fuste and Costa Calma offices handle taxes for residents and non-residents alike. Personal income tax (IRPF) and non-resident tax (IRNR), the two returns in which the imputed income of a second home is declared, are both on the list of services of our advisory page, and a first meeting can be booked online.

Common questions

Is the sliding scale for second homes in force?

No. It was written by Real Decreto-ley 26/2026 to apply from 1 January 2027, and Congress repealed that decree on 2 October 2026. The Income Tax Act keeps the two flat percentages: 2 %, or 1.1 % where the cadastral values came into force in the tax year or in the ten before it.

Do I pay 2 % or 1.1 % on a property in Fuerteventura?

On 2 % in five of the six municipalities: La Oliva, Pájara, Puerto del Rosario, Antigua and Tuineje, whose values date from 1994 to 2002. Only Betancuria, whose values came into force in 2025, is on the 1.1 %. The percentage is applied to the cadastral value on the IBI receipt.

Does the repeal change the return I am about to file for 2025?

No. The return for 2025 is calculated with the percentages above and can be filed until 31 December 2026. For 2025 the tax agency also applies the 1.1 % to towns revalued since 2012, which on Fuerteventura changes nothing.

Could the 1.1 % for towns revalued since 2012 still apply to 2026?

Only if a new rule says so before the year ends. The extension for 2026 was in the repealed decree and is no longer in force. The tax accrues on 31 December, so what counts is the text in force that day; the extensions for 2024 and 2025 each came in a decree of 23 December.

When is the Modelo 210 for imputed income filed?

Once a year, for the year before. The return for 2025 can be filed until 31 December 2026. From the 2026 tax year the window runs from 1 April to 31 December of the following year, and to 23 December if the payment is by direct debit.

Facts verified in October 2026 (Ley 35/2006, article 85 and its 55th additional provision, in every version published in the Official State Gazette; texto refundido de la Ley del Impuesto sobre la Renta de no Residentes, Real Decreto Legislativo 5/2004, articles 24 and 25; Real Decreto-ley 26/2026, article 6, repealed by Congress on 2 October 2026 by a resolution published in the Official State Gazette that same day, with the vote totals of the Congress's own press note; Real Decreto 806/2026, of 5 October, dissolving Parliament and calling the election; Orden HAC/623/2026; the tax agency's pages on imputed income for residents and for non-residents; the Catastro's register of valuation reports for the provinces of Las Palmas and Santa Cruz de Tenerife, as they read on 2 October 2026). The figures of the examples are illustrative; this is general information, not advice on your case.