The licence is not a piece of paper. It is a list anyone can check.

"Licence" is not quite the right word

In the Balearics a home is not granted a tourist licence. Whoever wants to market it files a declaración responsable de inicio de actividad turística (DRIAT) with the island tourism administration, which in Ibiza is the Consell d'Eivissa. Advertising or letting without one, or with one but without meeting the requirements, is oferta ilegal (articles 28 and 52.3 of Ley 8/2012). The DRIAT goes in with the certificate of acquired tourist places, a municipal certificate that the zone is apta, and annex 6 of Decreto 20/2015 completed (article 50.22.e). Since 2025 owner and comercializador must deal with the administration electronically.

The comercializador, the party marketing the stays, can be the owner or a third party (articles 49 and 50.1). That matters more than it sounds, because it is the name filed with the Consell and the name on the guest contract.

The house: what it has to be

The home must be residential, with a cédula de habitabilidad or licencia de ocupación stating the number of places, and cannot market more places than that (articles 50.2 and 52.1). It needs at least five years of private residential use (50.17), an energy rating of F if built before 2008 or D if after (50.5), an individual water meter registered with the supplier if on mains, and its own electricity and gas meters (50.6). It needs one bathroom per four places (52.2), and can never be protected or price-capped housing (50.8).

Two rules on type. Since Decreto ley 4/2025 (second additional provision), no new DRIAT is accepted for homes under propiedad horizontal on any island, except terraced and semi-detached houses; a detached villa is unaffected. On rural land in Ibiza, norma 11.8 of the PTI, as worded by its modification 2 (BOIB 106, 9 August 2025), only admits new activity in houses that appear in the 1956 aerial photograph. Those houses can use the general regime, with no 60-day cap. Casas payesas also have the main-residence modality, which must run at least 31 days outside July and August. The same norm requires a rural home to have a wastewater treatment system before it can be let.

Places: why a villa without them can barely get them

In Mallorca, Ibiza and Formentera, buying tourist places and swapping them between private parties is still suspended (first additional provision of Ley 3/2022). Decreto ley 4/2025 removed the four-year cap: the suspension lasts until the Consell sets a ceiling based on a carrying-capacity study. There are exceptions, such as moving places from one of your own homes to another.

Meanwhile there are temporary pools, filled only with places from homes that leave the register, allocated one for one in order of application (second transitional provision of Decreto ley 4/2025; Consell d'Eivissa resolution, BOIB 77, 19 June 2025). The price is set by the island's 2013 ordinance; La Voz de Ibiza reports a minimum of 4.300 euros per place.

Running it: what the activity must include

The comercializador must provide cleaning, bed linen and household goods, and maintenance (article 51.1), and record in a libro registro enabled by the Consell who carries out those services (51.2). There must be 24-hour phone assistance (51.3) and liability insurance (50.16). Guest details go to the police (50.11), the whole house is let and never by the room (50.15), and no stay may exceed 30 nights (50.13). The contract must expressly ban parties, and if one happens the guest has to leave within 24 hours (50.12). Serviced extinguishers and the first aid kit come from annex 6 of Decreto 20/2015.

The number on the listing

Every advertisement for a tourist home must carry its registration number (article 28.3.a), and a platform that publishes a listing without it commits a very serious infringement (120.j). The state number has lost its weight: the Tribunal Supremo ruling of 19 May 2026 (BOE, 8 June 2026) annulled the single-registration procedure of Real Decreto 1312/2024 and the duty to register at the Registro de la Propiedad to obtain a number. The digital single window for data-sharing with platforms survives. The number that protects you is the one the Consell assigns.

Who answers if something is missing

The owner, the comercializador and any tenant are liable, "salvo prueba en contrario", and jointly where the shares cannot be separated (article 117.4 and 5). Very serious infringements carry fines of 50.001 to 500.000 euros and can bring loss of the DRIAT or closure (123.3). A sanctioned home cannot change owner until the fine is paid (50.4). Our note on who is fined when an agent lists a villa wrongly goes into this in more detail.

Where it is lost: not on the calendar

On a detached house the DRIAT does not expire. The five-year term with renewal applies to apartment buildings (articles 50.3 and 50.22.c). The risk is not a date but drift: an expired extinguisher tag, a policy that was not renewed, a listing someone else edited. And inactivity: the Consell can permanently remove a home that has not been marketed for three consecutive years (85.2), and Decreto ley 4/2025 gave it two years to review them all. Among the evidence the text names are missing tourist tax returns and no guest reports sent to the police.

How to check it from your own papers

Make a list with one line per requirement and three columns: the document that proves it, who issues it, and when it expires. The DRIAT and number are issued by the Consell and do not expire; the energy certificate lasts ten years; the policy, one; the extinguisher service, one, with a pressure test every five. Next to it, keep a dated screenshot of every listing. That is how we review our own villas at the end of each season: once a year, with the document in front of us, not from memory.

What this guide does not cover

It does not cover buying a villa with or without places or transferring them, the tourist tax, safety equipment in detail, apartments or the main-residence modality in towns, Formentera, tax (IRPF, IVA, IBI), or whether a particular building is lawful as built. Norma 11.8 of the PTI regulates new activity; if its wastewater requirement may affect a villa already letting, ask the Consell. It assesses no particular property.

This guide is our own research and our reading of the subject, published for educational purposes only. It is not legal or tax advice: it describes the rules as we understand them and names the papers that answer the question, it assesses no particular property, and reading it creates no professional relationship. Take what you find to your own abogado, tax adviser or administrador de fincas.