Buying a small hotel in Spain: prices, returns, licences and what to check

A small trading hotel or hostal of 10–50 rooms in Spain sells for about €97,000 per room on average: around €105,000 on the coast and €73,000 inland.

The median property in a 2026 sample was 16 rooms for €1.85m.

The return on the price is usually 4–6% a year; payback including the building takes 15–20 years.

Below: what a small or resort hotel costs, what it earns by category and province, where new hotels cannot open, which taxes the owner pays and what to check before buying.

The page includes a payback calculator with an illustrative 20-room hotel.

What a small hotel costs in Spain

We reviewed 53 listings for trading hotels and hostales of 10–50 rooms (thinkspain, October 2026).

The median is €97,368 per room, and half the properties fall between €60,000 and €206,000 per room. The median price is €1.85m and the median size 16 rooms.

Listing prices are asking prices; deals close lower.

Do not benchmark against large transactions: in the first half of 2026 Spanish hotels sold for an average of €213,300 per room — a record, but for 4–5-star hotels and portfolios, not small hotels.

The market is active: €4.2–4.3bn went into hotels in 2025 and €2.46bn in the first half of 2026, up 26.5%.

Few new hotels are being built — supply grows by 0.7% a year — which supports prices for existing ones.

Small hotel, hostal or resort hotel: the difference for an investor

Hotel establishments fall into groups: hotel (including hotel-apartments), hostal and pensión.

A hostal has lighter requirements and a lower entry price, but it sells rooms for less and fills them less. INE figures for 2025 show the gap:

A hostal sells rooms 35–45% cheaper than a 4-star hotel and fills 20–30 percentage points fewer.

So the real difference is revenue per available room (RevPAR), not the purchase price: a cheap room at low occupancy pays back more slowly than an expensive one.

A resort hotel is a seasonal business. In the Balearics, 133 hotels were open in winter 2025 and 1,381 in summer.

In Girona, Almería and Cádiz, winter revenue per room is four to six times lower than in summer.

The Canary Islands are the exception: in Tenerife, revenue per room in January 2026 was even higher than in August.

What a hotel earns: occupancy and revenue by province

In August 2026 the average room rate in Spain was €166.9 and revenue per available room €133.1. The 2025 averages were about €125 and €86. By resort province (2025 average, all categories, INE):

INE data covers open hotels only: those closed in winter are left out, so resort winter occupancy looks better than it is.

Costs. According to HotStats, the gross operating profit (GOP) margin of Spanish hotels in 2025 was 41% of revenue — but the sample is mostly chain hotels.

A small hotel without scale earns less; 30–40% is a sensible planning figure.

Staff is the largest cost: in Málaga a waiter on the collective agreement earns €1,511.88 a month, 15 times a year — about €30,000 a year per position including employer contributions.

Booking. In 2024 Spain’s competition authority (CNMC) fined Booking €413.24m and put its share of online hotel bookings in Spain at 70–90%.

Booking’s commission is usually 10–25% of the room price. The more direct bookings, the higher the margin.

Hotel payback calculator

The calculator holds an illustrative 20-room 3-star coastal hotel: price €2.1m (€105,000 per room), plus €150,000 for refurbishment and start-up cash.

Revenue uses INE averages for 3-star hotels: €99.5 × 70.4% occupancy × 20 rooms ≈ €42,600 a month.

Commissions and consumables are 15% of revenue, staff €18,000 a month, other costs €4,500 a month.

Pre-tax profit is about €164,500 a year, about €131,000 after tax: 5.8% on a €2.25m investment, with payback in about 17 years.

Seventeen years is normal for a hotel bought with its building: the owner keeps the property.

Compare the return on investment with hotel lease yields: for prime assets in Spain that is 5% in Madrid and Barcelona and 6% on the islands.

The same 20-room hostal on average hostal figures (about €35 of revenue per room per day) brings in about €255,000 a year — at the same building price the yield is 3.7–4.9%, below the market. Occupancy and category make the money, not a cheap price per room.

To assess a project once time and the cost of money are taken into account, see IRR (internal rate of return); for how sellers justify a price, see How to value a business for sale.

Buy, lease to an operator or hire a manager

• Buy the building with the business and run it yourself. All occupancy and all risk sit with the owner. For a 10–30-room hotel this is the main option: chain operators rarely take on properties this small.
• Buy the building and lease it to an operator. The owner receives rent; this is the model for which consultants quote 5–6% yields. Leasing a non-residential building carries VAT at the standard 21% rate.
• A management company. According to HVS for Europe, the base fee is 2–4% of revenue plus 8–15% of operating profit and 1–4% for bookings and marketing; contracts usually run 15–25 years.

Where you cannot open a new hotel

Hotels are regulated by each region’s own decree: Decreto 10/2021 in the Valencian Community, Decreto 47/2004 as amended by Decreto-ley 13/2020 in Andalusia, Decreto 75/2020 in Catalonia, Decreto 19/2023 in Madrid and Decreto 142/2010 in the Canaries.

Almost everywhere a new hotel opens on a declaration and registration in the regional tourism register, plus a municipal licence. But in some places new beds are restricted:

• Balearic Islands. New tourist beds only come from buying existing ones: in Mallorca a hotel bed costs €3,500, and new beds in apartment buildings have been banned since 2025. A 40-room hotel with 2 beds per room means another €280,000 just for the right to the beds.
• Canary Islands. On Lanzarote, Fuerteventura, Gran Canaria and Tenerife new permits go mainly to renovations, historic buildings, rural tourism, bed swaps and 5-star hotels.
• Barcelona. The 2021 PEUAT plan applies: no new hotels in the centre, only maintaining bed numbers around it, growth on the periphery.

That is why a hotel with a licence in these places costs more than the same building without one: the buyer pays for beds that are no longer issued.

What to check before buying a hotel

1. The tourism register. The registration number, group, category, number of rooms and beds must match what is for sale. “Runs as a hotel” does not mean “registered as a hotel”.
2. Who is selling. The seller of the business and the owner of the building are not always the same. In June 2026 a court in Torrevieja closed a 49-room hotel as legally non-existent: a tenant was running it, and the building’s owners brought the claim.
3. Municipal licences. The activity licence and the occupancy licence, and whether the building matches its approved plans.
4. Accessibility and fire safety. A hotel with 5–50 rooms needs at least one accessible room (CTE DB-SUA 9); an older building often needs money to meet current rules — build it into the price.
5. The numbers. Occupancy and average rate by month for 3 years from the booking system, bank statements, Booking and Expedia reports, VAT returns (modelo 303 and 390). If the seller claims 85% annual occupancy for a hostal when the Spanish average is 44–48%, ask for proof.
6. Debts and staff. The buyer of a business is liable for the seller’s tax debts (art. 42.1.c LGT) unless they obtain a tax-debt certificate before the deal (art. 175.2 LGT); for Social Security debts (art. 168.2 LGSS); staff transfer with all their rights, and seller and buyer are jointly liable for employment debts for 3 years (art. 44 ET).

If you are buying the owning company (an SL), its debts stay with it — you need full due diligence.

How an existing business is checked before you pay a deposit is described on our traspaso audit page.

Taxes for a hotel owner

• VAT. Accommodation is taxed at the reduced 10% rate (art. 91.Uno.2.2º Ley 37/1992).
• Tax on purchase. Selling a hotel as a whole going concern is outside the scope of VAT (art. 7.1º Ley 37/1992); the property within it is then subject to transfer tax (ITP) at the regional rate.
• IBI. A town hall may set a higher property-tax rate for hotels, but only for the 10% most valuable properties of that use (art. 72.4 RDL 2/2004).
• Tourist tax. In the Balearics a hotel collects €2–4 per guest per night depending on category, a hostal €1, with 75% off in winter; Catalonia raised its tax from April 2026; the Valencian Community scrapped its tax before it took effect.
• Corporate tax. If the hotel belongs to an SL, in 2026 a company with turnover under €1m pays 19% on the first €50,000 of profit and 21% above; under €10m, 23%. How best to take profit out is covered in Salary or dividends from a Spanish SL; when a holding company pays off for several properties, in Holding company in Spain.

If you are moving to Spain for this business

A non-resident can buy a hotel, but a non-EU citizen can live in Spain and run it personally only with a residence permit — usually a self-employment permit, for one year at first.

The golden visa has been abolished, and the startup visa does not suit an ordinary hotel.

Which permit to choose, in what order to proceed and how your personal taxes change after the move is covered by Relotus in «Small hotel in Spain for foreigners».

Frequently asked questions

How much does a small hotel cost in Spain?

In a sample of 2026 listings, trading hotels and hostales of 10–50 rooms cost an average of €97,000 per room: about €105,000 on the coast and €73,000 inland. The median property is 16 rooms for €1.85m.

What return does a hotel in Spain make?

Prime hotels leased to an operator yield 5–6% a year. A small hotel run by its owner returns about 4–6% on the purchase price after tax on average INE figures. More only comes with occupancy and room rates above the provincial average.

What occupancy does a hostal achieve?

According to INE, hostales and pensiones filled 44–48% of rooms on average over 2025 and 59–61% in August. 3-star hotels filled 70% over the year and 4-star hotels 76%.

Can you open a new hotel in the Balearics?

Only with beds bought from existing properties: in Mallorca a hotel bed costs €3,500. New tourist beds in apartment buildings are banned. That is why buyers usually acquire a hotel that already has its beds.

Is the buyer of a hotel liable for the seller’s debts?

Yes, when buying a trading business: for taxes unless a tax-debt certificate is obtained, for Social Security debts, and staff transfer to the buyer. When buying the company, all its debts stay with it.

What VAT applies to a hotel?

Accommodation is taxed at 10%. Leasing the hotel building to an operator carries the standard 21% rate. Selling a hotel as a going concern is outside VAT, and the property within it is subject to transfer tax.

Key points about buying a hotel in Spain

• A small hotel or hostal of 10–50 rooms costs an average of €97,000 per room, about €105,000 on the coast.
• The return on price is 4–6%, payback including the building 15–20 years; compare with hotel lease yields of 5–6%.
• A hostal is cheaper to buy but sells rooms 35–45% cheaper and fills fewer of them than a 3–4-star hotel.
• In the Balearics, the Canaries and central Barcelona new beds are restricted — a licence there is worth money.
• Before buying: the tourism register, who owns the building, licences, accessibility rules, booking-system figures and the seller’s debts.

Sources

• INE — Coyuntura Turística Hotelera, August 2026: ine.es; hotel profitability indicators — INE tables 2057–2059.
• Colliers — hotel investment, first half of 2026: colliers.com; CBRE — Figures Hoteles Q4 2025: cbre.com.
• HotStats — Spanish hotel performance 2025: hospitalitynet; HVS — hotel management contracts in Europe: hvs.com.
• CNMC — Booking decision, 2024: cnmc.es.
• Ley 37/1992 (VAT) — BOE; Ley 58/2003 (LGT) — BOE; RDL 2/2015 (ET) — BOE; RDL 2/2004 (IBI) — BOE.
• Balearics, price of a tourist bed in Mallorca — derecholocal; Balearic tourist tax — Spanish Ministry of Finance.
• Hotel listings — thinkspain, October 2026.