Spain proposes 100% tax on non-EU house buyers
Spain's government is pushing ahead with a controversial proposal to hit non-European Union residents with a 100 per cent tax when buying homes, as it seeks to tackle a brewing housing crisis.
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez's Socialist party presented the plan as part of a broader housing bill submitted to Parliament on Thursday.
The bill seeks to promote 'measures that enable access to housing, since we are facing one of the largest problems our society is currently confronted with', according to a copy of the draft legislation seen by Bloomberg.
Sanchez first announced plans to create the new tax in January, in an attempt to address growing discontent over surging real estate prices and housing shortages in areas including Madrid and Barcelona.
At the time, Sanchez said foreigners were snapping up homes and speculating on price increases, and that non-EU residents bought 27,000 properties in 2023.
UK citizens are the biggest foreign buyers of Spanish property, mainly in coastal regions such as Valencia, Andalusia and the Balearic Islands. Germans, Dutch and other EU citizens will be exempt.
The UK left the EU in early 2020, severing political ties it had held for almost half a century. It then stayed inside the EU single market and customs union for almost a year to facilitate trade.
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