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Hundreds of unlicensed Murcia holiday lets caught advertising online
More than 400 tourist flats across the Region of Murcia were being illegally offered for rent
The problem with unregulated and illegal holiday home rentals is being gradually brought under control in the Region of Murcia, but at a much slower pace than is ideal.
Between January and August 2024, inspectors found a total of 421 illegal tourist homes in the Region of Murcia advertised on the main online rental sites, mainly Booking.com.
And while these figures have dropped a little, they’re still very close to the entire 2023 tally, when 470 irregular apartments were detected.
Fines for property owners range from 20,001 to 40,000 euros, and while tourists won’t be fined if they unwittingly book an illegal rental, they could arrive in Spain to find their accommodation has been shut down and have to fork out for an alternative apartment.
This data was presented by the Institute of Tourism of the Region of Murcia (ITREM), which represents the main players in the sector and is tasked with monitoring all of the online booking platforms.
“What we are doing now is contacting the online platforms to inform them that these accommodations are not licensed, so that they can be removed from the sites,” explained ITREM general director Juan Francisco Martínez. “Likewise, the owners of these tourist apartments are informed that, in order to advertise again on this platform, they have to register the mandatory responsible declaration, fulfilling the requirements established by the decree that applies to their tourist accommodation.”
These regulations are in place to guarantee that all holiday lets comply with important quality, safety and emergency standards. So far this year, the Tourism Institute’s Planning Office has initiated disciplinary proceedings for non-compliance on 36 property owners.
The issue of unregulated and unlisted tourist apartments should be brought further to heel in 2026, when a European directive will require all of the online booking platforms to check for licences before they can publish a rental advert.
In other news: Critically endangered baby mussels stolen from the Mar Menor
Image: Freepik
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