Compiled with the help of artificial intelligence, based on Spanish-language information. Source below the article.
Canarias moves to restrict property purchases by non-residents
The President of the Canary Islands Government, Fernando Clavijo (Coalición Canaria), has put a proposal before the central government to limit property purchases by non-residents, following several attempts to revive the measure that had never come to fruition. On Thursday, the regional government announced a draft royal decree law setting out nine points to restrict the acquisition of property in the archipelago. Among them are a requirement for a minimum of ten years of uninterrupted registration as a resident, and a cap of two homes per individual buyer. The aim is to ease pressure on a property market that has been weighing on the islands for more than a decade, and to make it easier for Canarians to access housing.
A measure Coalition Canaria long opposed
However, before turning the restriction of non-resident property purchases into one of its own proposals, Coalición Canaria repeatedly voted against opposition initiatives that put forward similar measures. Just four days after the 20A elections, NC-BC tabled a motion containing a raft of provisions to control tourism growth, among them an eco-tax, a moratorium and limits on property purchases by foreign buyers. CC’s grounds for rejecting it centred on legal difficulties and a possible clash with European regulations. Two years later, in the middle of the pre-election campaign, they have now put it to the central government.
A few months later, during the campaign for the June 2024 European elections, CC candidate Carlos Alonso made limiting new residents his slogan. He argued for taxing property purchases by foreigners and restricting their acquisition. But Clavijo again ruled out adopting such measures on the grounds that they clashed head-on with one of the basic pillars of the European Union: the free movement of capital and the prohibition of discrimination on grounds of nationality within member states. The regional government even commissioned a study to determine the legal viability of introducing such measures, despite Alonso maintaining that they were compatible with European law.
The ultra-peripheral route and Article 349
During this parliamentary term, the Canarian president has argued that any limitation must have European legal backing. In an attempt to get around this legal obstacle, the regional executive explored the route of its special status within Europe as an outermost region. Clavijo sought to use Article 349 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU, which recognises that outermost regions such as Canarias suffer permanent structural disadvantages, to argue that property pressure and the shortage of land in the islands justified a historic exception allowing them to veto purchases by foreigners.
For the Canarian measure to be accepted by Europe, it would have to clear two highly complex legal hurdles. The first is the principle of proportionality: Canarias would have to demonstrate legally that banning property purchases is the only suitable measure to resolve the housing crisis and that no less drastic and restrictive alternatives exist. The second is non-discrimination by passport: European law explicitly prohibits blocking a German, Italian or mainland Spanish citizen solely on the basis of their origin. But the absence of a formula guaranteeing its fit with EU rules has kept the proposal awaiting concrete progress for months, until yesterday.
A “window” opened by the Irish EU presidency
As social pressure in Canarias over the housing crisis has grown, Clavijo has continued to dust off the issue at European level. At the end of September 2026, the Canarian president said he was “hopeful” after meeting officials in Europe, stating that a “window of three or four months” was opening, coinciding with the Irish presidency of the EU, to make progress on the restriction. Days later, on 15 October, the Canarian government sent the state government a draft proposing ten years of continuous residency registration — or fifteen non-continuous — to buy a home in the islands, and limiting to two the number of homes a person may acquire.
The proposal is no longer aimed exclusively at foreigners, but instead uses length of residence as the criterion. Its application will depend on the response of the central government and on whether it clears the legal impediments that have conditioned the debate from the outset.
Experts say the measure alone is not enough
The evolution of the measure shows how Clavijo has gone from rejecting certain restrictive formulas to defending a new legal route to limit property purchases in Canarias. And although he has finally done so, weeks before the general election of 29N, various economists, urban planners and property sector experts confirm that the proposal would not solve the crisis on its own and is insufficient, since it tackles only one symptom of demand without resolving the structural failures of the Canarian market.
The sector insists that a structural solution requires speeding up land management, unblocking licences and building protected housing (VPO). Likewise, the central argument of the citizens’ platforms grouped under the ‘Canarias tiene un límite’ movement recalls that the archipelago has a huge stock of empty homes — some 211,452, according to the INE, many of them concentrated in small municipalities — along with an uncontrolled proliferation of holiday lets. What is more, Canarias has spent nearly two decades with public housing construction practically frozen, a structural halt that began in 2012 after the drastic budget cuts imposed by the Rajoy government and its austerity policies, which eliminated state funding for protected housing. Today, experts point out that it is more urgent and effective to mobilise that existing housing stock and to incentivise small owners to bring their properties onto the long-term rental market.
What’s happening in the Canaries – straight to your phone
News, weather alerts and practical updates – direct from the islands, in English. We live here and know what’s going on – before the international media catch up. Everything lands on our WhatsApp channel – no middlemen, no algorithm. Curated for families, expats and travelers.
Los Realejos residents fight on against propane gas plant
Canarias among Spain’s poorest regions as 36.2% live on low incomes
Canary Islands bananas lose ground to imported bananas
Canary Islands bottom of Spain’s social housing table
Three migrant boats reach Canary Islands in 24 hours
Gran Canaria hotel maid arrested over stolen gold necklace
Canary Islands plan 10-year residency rule to buy a home
Canary Islands launches empty homes rental scheme
Canary Islands push to ban non-resident property purchases
