This is a summary of public documents, written by a locksmith, not legal advice. For your own property, ask the town hall or a lawyer. What follows is taken from the town hall’s memoria justificativa for its holiday-let ordinance, published in June 2026.
Why the town hall acted
The municipality’s planning rules date from 1987 and said nothing about tourist lets. Registered tourist dwellings grew from 441 in 2012 to 1,219 in 2025, and their bed places from 915 to 4,377. More than nine in ten are in the Albir area. The town hall reports complaints from neighbours, particularly in the residential upper Albir, about lets inside blocks and between family homes.
What has happened so far
- 30 August 2024: the town council suspended new urban compatibility reports for tourist lets, for up to two years, while a regulation was drafted.
- January 2025: a public consultation on the ordinance.
- 2025–2026: a draft ordinance and its environmental review.
What the draft says
- Lets are considered suitable in blocks of flats, terraced houses, and detached houses with at least ten metres from the house to the side boundaries.
- In blocks, letting the whole building is preferred; otherwise the owners’ community must agree, certified by its president or secretary.
- Semi-detached houses (pareados) are left out, mostly because of how close they stand to their neighbours.
- Lets of more than ten days fall outside the tourist rules and under ordinary seasonal rental law.
What changes at the door
Nothing about how a lock works changes with an ordinance. What changes is who is involved.
- In a block, the community has a say in whether a flat is let at all. Anything fixed to a shared wall or the street door, such as a key box, is worth agreeing with the community too.
- In a detached house, the gate and the front door become the guest’s first impression. A gate lock that sticks costs reviews.
- If you stop letting, the cylinders are worth changing: you cannot know how many keys left with guests and cleaners over the years. That is an ordinary lock change, booked on a day that suits.
And if you keep letting
Do the spring check on the key box before the season, keep the locksmith’s number in your welcome message, and decide in advance whether the invoice for a lockout goes to you, to the agency or to the guest. The holiday rental page explains how those calls are handled.