Guess what?

Everyone knows Andalucía froze new short-term rental licenses. That's not news anymore—it's been the cocktail-hour complaint from Sotogrande to Nerja for weeks.

What's less discussed is that, while the freeze is temporary, the compliance architecture underneath it is permanent. And it affects people who already hold licenses, not just those seeking new ones.

Your VFT has been running for three years. No problems. Good reviews. Quiet guests, mostly.

Then a neighbour complains about parking. The Ayuntamiento — town hall — gets a call. Someone checks your file.

The updated registration form asks you to confirm your comunidad — homeowners' association — explicitly authorized tourist use. You never got that vote. It wasn't required in 2022.

Now you need a three-fifths majority from the same neighbours who just filed the complaint.

That's the trap in Decreto-ley 1/2025 that nobody's talking about while everyone debates the freeze.

Here's the quiet trap in Decreto-ley 1/2025.

The new declaración responsable — responsible declaration — you file with the Junta now requires you to attest that tourist use is "not prohibited by community statutes" and has been "expressly authorised" by your building's owners.

Most existing VFT holders never got that explicit authorization. It wasn't required. They registered, they listed, they operated. The comunidad either didn't notice or didn't object.

Now it's codified. If you ever need to update your registration, renew, or re-file after a complaint, you'll face a form that asks you to confirm something you may not actually have.

Getting that authorization typically requires a three-fifths vote. Your retired vecinos — neighbours — who moved here for peace and quiet, just acquired veto power over your rental income.

Worth checking your building's statutes before your next comunidad meeting gets interesting.

Under the old system, you filed with the Junta, and that was mostly that.

Now, the Junta notifies your Ayuntamiento — town hall — of every registration. The municipality can flag "inconsistencies" with urban planning rules. If they do, the Junta can cancel your inscription and bar you from re-registering for a year.

Translation: if your property's planning compatibility is ambiguous, filing a declaration now sends your address directly to the office that can challenge it.

For existing operators with solid paperwork, this changes nothing. For anyone who registered during the "nobody really checked" era, it's worth confirming your urban planning status is as clean as you assumed.

When municipalities eventually lift the moratorium, new applicants will still face:

Gate one: Comunidad authorization (explicit, potentially requiring a vote)

Gate two: Ayuntamiento urban planning compatibility confirmation

Gate three: Junta registration that cross-checks with the municipality

Gate four: National Número de Registro for platform listing (required since 1 July 2025)

The freeze bought time to build enforcement infrastructure. The infrastructure stays.

Marbella: Building a separate municipal registry and blocking commercial-to-tourist conversions. More oversight machinery coming.

Estepona: €127.10 for an urban compatibility certificate, 15-day stated turnaround. At least the process is documented.

Benahavís: No published STR ordinance. Case-by-case planning review. Less predictable.

While everyone argues about Airbnb, the regional water infrastructure quietly improved.

Marbella's desalination plant completed its upgrade in July 2025—capacity now 20 hm³/year, which we’ve discussed before. Then, in September, ACOSOL was awarded €7.6 million for energy efficiency improvements. Now, a second pre-project for a desalination plant was tendered this month, while we have all new traffic between Benalmádena and Torremolinos due to pipeline works underway.

Drought restrictions eased to "normality" this past spring—allocation: 250 litres per person per day. Beach showers work again.

The water authority is engineering the coast as drought-prone by default. That's the correct assumption. When it comes to water, municipalities are finally catching up and realizing that the Costa is growing beyond just a tourist attraction into something much more interesting and balanced.

For your next comunidad meeting:

"¿Los estatutos permiten el uso turístico de las viviendas?" — Do the statutes permit tourist use of properties?

"¿Se ha votado una autorización expresa para alquileres turísticos?" — Has an explicit authorization for tourist rentals been voted on?

The STR freeze is a pause button. The compliance stack is the new operating system. Existing license holders aren't exempt from scrutiny—they're just not in the queue for initial approval. The comunidad authorization requirement, the cross-verification between Junta and Ayuntamiento, and the platform-level registration gate: all of that applies to renewals, updates, and anyone who catches municipal attention.

If you're operating legally with clean paperwork, carry on. If you registered during the "file and forget" era, this is a reasonable week to pull your comunidad statutes and confirm your urban planning status.

Your neighbours just became stakeholders in your rental business. It might be worth knowing where they stand before they know where you stand.

Nearly there — A. and the willing to sell their vote Waypoint Sur team

With Waypoint Sur, you can always expect plain-English guidance to land, settle, and thrive on the Costa del Sol—work, schools, healthcare, visas, taxes, home, and daily life.  
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