The tourist accommodation rental platform Airbnb will have to pay a fine of 64 million euros in Spain due to the publication of illegal advertisements, the Spanish Government announced this Monday, 15th.
At issue are 65,122 advertisements for houses and apartments without a license to be rented as tourist accommodation or which displayed a false or incorrect license number, revealed the Ministry of Social Rights and Consumption, in a statement.
The fine is imposed after Airbnb’s administrative appeals were rejected, the Ministry said.
The Government’s resolution also requires Airbnb to eliminate all illegal advertisements that continue to be published and to “make public the fine” imposed on it.
The Ministry explained that the amount of the fine results from a “serious infraction” and recalled that the Superior Court of Justice of Madrid, in response to Airbnb’s appeals, has already ruled in favor of the Government in several decisions regarding the requirement to remove the advertisements in question.
In the statement released today, the Minister of Consumption, Pablo Bustinduy (from the left-wing Somar party, which is in the government coalition led by the Socialists), highlighted that these measures aim to “contribute to combating the housing crisis in Spain, one of the country’s main problems”.
On the other hand, “no company in Spain, however big or powerful it may be, can be above the law”, said the minister, quoted in the statement.
Last May, the Government of Spain announced that it had asked Airbnb to remove 65,935 illegal listings because, among other reasons, they did not present a license or registration number or because the number they presented was wrong or did not exist.
The illegal advertisements advertised accommodation in six autonomous regions of Spain (Andalusia, Madrid, Catalonia, the Valencian Community, the Balearics and the Basque Country), said the Ministry of Social Rights and Consumption.
Spain, which received 94 million tourists in 2024, is the second tourist destination in the world, after France, and several cities in the country have been the scene of protests against mass tourism, mainly because of the difficulties it creates in accessing housing for local populations.
Cities like Barcelona have announced that they will no longer grant new local accommodation licenses and that existing ones will no longer be renewed as they expire. The chamber estimates that there will no longer be apartments for tourists in the city by 2028.