The owners of houses for tourist use oppose any new regulation that translates into a reduction of existing licences. “That would put 46% of the tourist offer in Catalonia at risk,” warns David Riba, president of the Catalan Federation of Tourist Apartments (Federatur). The entity warns that the sector generates 26,291 direct jobs and represents 3.7% of tourism GDP.
“For a year the Generalitat has been working on a new regulation that we hope will culminate in the creation of a seal of excellence”, maintains Riba but at the same time acknowledges that “we are very concerned because we know very little about the new law and there are initiatives such as the one presented by En Comú with licenses valid for three years that are alarming; we need legal certainty, the rules of the game cannot be changed”.
In Catalonia there are 95,899 registered tourist accommodations with 526,284 beds, compared to 609,878 for hotel establishments, campsites and rural tourism. The average number of flats or tourist rental accommodation accounts for 2.5% of the total residential park and, according to Fedetur, corresponds to non-main residences.
“In many municipalities, empty housing exceeds tourist apartments”, maintains Riba, who also points out that the majority of the offer of tourist apartments is in the hands of individual owners, “only 13.34% have more than one apartment, therefore that they are not large holders, nor do they have a real capacity to exert a speculative effect on the price of the habitual residence”.
