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Barcelona’s short-term rental (STR) market is not a regulatory gap waiting to be filled. STRs have been regulated since 1998 and a moratorium on new licences has existed since 2014. Since then, the number of STRs has held steady at roughly 10,000 units for over a decade — barely 1 percent of total housing stock.

Yet Mayor Jaume Collboni intends to remove all legal STRs from the market by 2028. Framed as a housing remedy, the decision raises a broader and uncomfortable question for Brussels: how far can a public authority go in eliminating a lawful, regulated economic activity without first demonstrating that the measure is necessary, proportionate and effective?

A housing promise that doesn’t add up

Mayor Collboni has placed eliminating STRs at the center of his housing agenda. The promise is simple: remove STRs and those homes will return to residents. But evidence demonstrates the opposite. The city council has yet to demonstrate how eliminating legally licensed STRs would result in putting those houses on the market.

The city’s own research undermines their objective. The Barcelona Institute of Economics’ study, commissioned by the city council itself in September 2025, acknowledged that a full conversion of STR units to residential use “could be partial or might not occur at all for various reasons . For example, some homes could move to the seasonal rental market or remain closed and vacant pending court rulings.”

The promise is simple: remove STRs and those homes will return to residents. But evidence demonstrates the opposite.

New York’s 2023 STR ban already offers a cautionary precedent: it did not slow rent growth or improve housing supply. Instead, it created an unaffordable tourism destination with one of the world’s most expensive hotel markets, averaging above $300 per night. Less competition does not mean lower prices, usually it means the opposite.

As Marian Muro, general director of Apartur (Barcelona Tourist Apartments Association), explains: “Barcelona’s affordability crisis is real, but its roots lie elsewhere: a chronic shortage of affordable housing, slow and rigid planning procedures, limited new construction, and a substantial stock of vacant properties that remain off the market. Rental prices have risen by up to 70 percent according to data from Barcelona City Council and Idealista — yet STR licences have been capped since 2014. If short-term rentals were driving the crisis, prices should have stabilised as supply held flat. They did not. None of those structural problems will be resolved by removing a regulated activity that has not grown in over a decade.”

Graph showing the absence of a correlation between the number of STRs and rising rents

Yet the Barcelona city council is deploying publicly funded advertising to present this unproven hypothesis as settled fact — less than a year before municipal elections in May 2027. There is a meaningful difference between a political party advocating for a position and a public administration using public funds to run what is, in effect, a pre-electoral political campaign.

City Council announcement in the run-up to the elections: “In Barcelona, in 2028, short-term letting licences will be abolished”.

Barcelona keeps inviting the world, but can’t explain where to put it

Barcelona spent decades positioning itself as Europe’s premier event destination — a magnet for congresses, festivals, trade fairs and international talent. Just months ago, Mayor Collboni was celebrating the extension of Barcelona’s airport, signaling the city’s ambition to welcome even more visitors.

Yet the same mayor intends to eliminate a sector that provides up to 40 percent of the city’s accommodation capacity during peak events, according to the official Tourism Observatory. The past two months illustrate the scale of the contradiction: Barcelona simultaneously hosted Sónar Festival, the Pope’s visit, Primavera Sound, the International Congress of Architects, and a Bad Bunny concert — all relying on the accommodation flexibility that STRs provide.

The tension has not gone unnoticed. During Mobile World Congress (MWC), Apartur launched a campaign highlighting this contradiction: “Coming to Barcelona for a conference? Get ready to sleep in a booth.” John Hoffman, CEO of GSMA, acknowledged the accommodation challenge openly, suggesting his organization may need to fall back on solutions like university housing: “We will be creative … to find ways for people to continue participating in MWC.”

When the organizer of the world’s largest mobile technology event is exploring university dormitories or even boats as a contingency plan for delegates, the contradiction is no longer hypothetical.

Apartur continued to raise the alarm through its latest campaign targeting attendees of Barcelona’s festival season, warning that if the ban goes ahead, visitors in 2028 may struggle to find affordable accommodation.

Apartur campaign visual: “POV: Going to a festival in Barcelona in 2028”.

A city cannot credibly invite the entire world and simultaneously dismantle the infrastructure that makes the invitation viable.

Chart showing the impact of the ban on STRs on major events such as Mobile World Congress and Sónar

The cost: 40,000 jobs at risk and a city priced out of reach

The downside risks are concrete. Projections by PwC put more than 40,000 direct and indirect jobs at stake — linked to cleaning, maintenance, transport, and local services. Reduced accommodation supply means less competition, higher prices and diminished accessibility for families, students, budget travelers or other visitors who need to stay in Barcelona while they or their loved ones are receiving medical treatment.

The spillover matters beyond accommodation. When visitors spend more on lodging, they spend less elsewhere. As Barcelona’s local restaurants association warned, “if visitor numbers fall, so do hospitality businesses, jobs and city GDP.”

Families bear a particular burden. The European Large Families Confederation wrote to Mayor Collboni in December 2025 urging reconsideration, noting that STRs offer the space and flexibility families with children require — and that alternatives “often mean booking multiple hotel rooms at double or triple the cost.”

Regulate, not eliminate: What Europe actually says

Framing this as tourism versus residents may be politically convenient but institutionally thin. The real question is whether a major European city can eliminate a lawful, licensed economic activity without a credible causal case — and what precedent that sets for Europe.

European institutions acknowledge that cities have the right to regulate STRs — but that is not a blank check to ban them. The Commission’s forthcoming Affordable Housing Act will allow cities to act on STRs in housing-stressed areas, provided measures are “justified and proportionate”.

Energy and Housing Commissioner Dan Jørgensen made the Commission’s position plain before the European Parliament’s Housing Committee on December 2: the Commission will not propose a ban on STRs because it “would be disproportionate” and “would not be a good idea”. The European Parliament’s own Resolution on the Housing Crisis calls for “a fair balance between tourism development and housing affordability”, with any local measures remaining necessary, appropriate and proportionate under Court of Justice of the European Union case law.

This is not a best practice to be inspired by, but a tangible example of missed opportunity and political scapegoating that should be avoided at all costs.

Ahead of the Affordable Housing Act’s publication, EU institutions should see Barcelona for what it is: not a best practice to be inspired by, but a tangible example of missed opportunity and political scapegoating that should be avoided at all costs.

Disclaimer

POLITICAL ADVERTISEMENT

The sponsor is APARTUR (Associació d’Apartaments Turístics de Barcelona) .

The entity ultimately controlling the sponsor is APARTUR (Associació d’Apartaments Turístics de Barcelona).

This article is linked to the EU-level legislative process – European Commission Affordable Housing Act (forthcoming), including the regulation of short-term rentals in housing-stressed areas.

More information here .