The general director of Planning, Training and Tourism Promotion of the Government of the Canary Islands, Miguel Ángel Rodríguez, spoke this Tuesday on Radio Lanzarote-Onda Cero to explain the main premises of the new draft of the Law on the Planning of Tourist Use of Housing, which was announced last week. This new text is the result of the almost 3,000 allegations received after the publication of the first draft of the bill, which was surrounded by controversy due to the number of requirements demanded of the owners.
During his speech, Rodríguez indicated that the town councils that do not have an updated planning plan, as is the case of Arrecife, will not be able to authorize a single tourist license once the law comes into force.
This regulation seeks to establish a limit to the excessive growth of holiday homes in the Canary Islands, which is one of the causes of the problems of rising rental prices on the islands, although not the only one. In addition, Rodríguez indicates that the rental of homes for tourist use already accounts for around 40% of the accommodation offer on the islands. For this reason, the general director of Tourism Promotion has assured in the morning program Buenos días, Lanzarote that these data "put at risk quality employment, competitiveness and the sustainability of the tourism industry in the Canary Islands."
In broad strokes, Rodríguez has pointed out that the future regulation has "a main axis" that determines that land destined for residential use can only be used for tourism "exceptionally." Until now, the regulation in force, Decree 113/2015, which was approved during the first legislature of Fernando Clavijo (CC) as Canarian president, allows a holiday home to be registered only by submitting a responsible declaration, against state law.
In this way, Miguel Ángel Rodríguez explains that the future regulation seeks to restore "the natural order of things" and that residential land can only be used as a habitual residence, renting to a third party or with seasonal rentals. Meanwhile, tourist use is in the hands of planning "democratically approved" and "adequately ordering the city, the town and the nucleus."
Despite the fact that the Canarian Executive announced that this new draft "flexibilizes" the law and seeks to combine "sustainability and protection for small owners", the Canarian Association of Holiday Rentals (ASCAV) assures that "all owners of apartments, bungalows and similar (almost 60% of current holiday homes) will be automatically expelled from holiday rentals."
"They effectively talk about purge and extermination, but it is not true and they are not reasonable terms, they are not proportionate terms and they do not respond to reality," he indicated. For example, "if you have a bungalow, know that you will not be able to continue because it is not a home, it is tourist accommodation from the old apartment decree and your holiday home was illegal and unlegalizable, it is not that the law expels or purges you, it is that you are not exercising legally."
For his part, the general director of Tourism Promotion indicates that this law must have "limits in quantity and "minimum quality requirements." Thus, it seeks to establish "a transitional regime" differentiated between "the owners who are also operators, from the operators who are not owners" and also determine what will happen to people who want to start in the future and register a holiday home. One of the key points of the law is that the town councils will be the ones who establish "how many, how and where" to grant these new tourist licenses.
Dam effect
The future law gives five years for the town councils to update their general planning plans and adapt them to the new regulations. Thus, in the case of Arrecife, whose planning plan is from 1996, "when the law comes into force there cannot be a single holiday home more, not one in five years," he said during his radio intervention.
From the Government of the Canary Islands they point out that this requirement is "a dam effect" that seeks to contain the increase in holiday homes. "We prevent the problem from continuing to grow, what happens in five years if the Arrecife City Council has not been able to bring forward an ordinance, a special plan or a minor modification?" Rodríguez questioned, "well, some rules are applied that are called subsidiary application that are in the law itself." Then, "some homes" can be registered if they meet a series of requirements.
Licenses cannot be transferred
Meanwhile, the owners will be able to maintain their exploitation indefinitely, except in case of sale or transfer to third parties. Nor will they be able to continue with the exploitation if they stop exploiting it touristically for a year or if it is part of an inheritance. "It is indefinite, but not in perpetuity, it is not transferable," the general director of Planning pointed out.
Thus, other requirements will remain. For example, if the holiday home is not exploited by the owner, but by a different person. Once the relationship between the two ends, the exploitation will also end. Otherwise, they will be able to continue exploiting the property for five years, and if in those five years the requirements continue to be met, they will be able to continue for a period of ten.
The modification of the draft also contemplates the possibility of continuing to exploit a home touristically for 20 years if it is compensated by putting equivalent homes on the rental market in the same nucleus. "For each home for tourist use, a home for residential use within the municipal area. If it is going to be offered in another nucleus, the appropriate proportion is two long-stay rentals to one tourist," he indicated. "The law never proposes a closed option, it always gives at least one or two more alternatives," he indicated.
Inspections in homes that do not comply
Rodríguez explains that within the fiscalization of holiday homes there are three different processes: verify if the responsible declaration is fulfilled and if the home meets the characteristics of habitability and the rest of the legal requirements, which the Cabildo must take care of; and verify that it meets the characteristics of a classified activity, which the City Council is in charge of; to conclude, the Government of the Canary Islands is in charge of inspecting and sanctioning.
To prevent holiday homes or rentals of up to a year in duration that do not comply with the law, the Government of Spain is coordinating with the rest of the autonomous communities the obligation for platforms to remove all advertisements that do not comply with the law. "When the Regulation is implemented it will be automatic, apart from the City Council, the Cabildo and the Government of the Canary Islands, it will be the Government of Spain with that regulation, saying outside and they have 48 hours to take it out and if the platform does not do it, it can be sanctioned," Rodríguez explained.
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