Modelo 210: the Spanish non-resident tax, explained in full

What the IRNR is and who pays it

The IRNR is the Impuesto sobre la Renta de no Residentes, Spain's income tax for non-residents. Article 1 of the consolidated text of its law, approved by Royal Legislative Decree 5/2004, defines it as a direct tax on the income obtained in Spanish territory by individuals and entities that do not reside there.

The difference from the IRPF, the income tax Spanish residents pay, fits in one sentence: the IRPF is paid by whoever has their habitual residence in Spain (article 8.1.a of Law 35/2006) and the IRNR is paid by whoever does not have it and still obtains income here. Article 5.a) of the IRNR Law says exactly that: taxpayers are the non-resident individuals and entities that obtain income in Spanish territory, unless they are IRPF taxpayers. The taxable event is simply that, obtaining income, in money or in kind, in Spanish territory (article 12.1).

Article 13 lists which income counts as obtained in Spain. If you own a property here, three of its letters hit you directly:

• 13.1.g), income derived, directly or indirectly, from immovable property located in Spanish territory. That is rent.
• 13.1.h), income imputed to individual taxpayers who own urban property located in Spanish territory not assigned to an economic activity. That is the empty home, or the one you use yourself.
• 13.1.i).3.º, capital gains arising, directly or indirectly, from that property. That is the sale.

The modelo 210 is the self-assessment form used to declare all of them. And it is not optional: article 28.1 requires taxpayers who obtain income without a permanent establishment to file a return, working out and paying the tax due. Nobody is going to post you a bill. The AEAT (Agencia Estatal de Administración Tributaria, the Spanish tax agency) does not issue one for this: you assess the tax yourself and you pay it yourself.

The question that comes first: are you really a non-resident?

Everything that follows depends on one condition worth checking before anything else: that you are not a tax resident in Spain. Your passport does not decide it, nor does the padrón (the town hall population register), nor where your bank account is. The IRNR does not even define it on its own: its article 6 refers to article 9 of Law 35/2006, the IRPF law.

That article 9.1 opens several doors, and crossing one of them is enough to be resident:

• The 183 days. You are resident if you stay more than 183 days of the calendar year in Spanish territory. And the article itself adds the point most people overlook: sporadic absences are added in for that count, unless you prove your tax residence in another country. Counting days without a certificate from the foreign tax authority means building your defence on the wrong test.
• The centre of your economic interests. You are resident if the main core or the base of your activities or economic interests is in Spain, directly or indirectly (article 9.1.b). You can spend a hundred days here and be resident by this route.
• The family presumption. If your spouse, not legally separated, and your dependent minor children habitually live in Spain, you are presumed to live there too, unless you prove otherwise. It is a presumption you can knock down, but the burden of proof is now yours.

If you come out resident, the 210 is not your form: you will be taxed under the IRPF. If you are not resident, read on. Sporadic absences, dual residence and the tie-breaker cascade of the tax treaties (permanent home, centre of vital interests, habitual abode, nationality) are in the guide on tax residence in Spain, together with what the term residencia fiscal (tax residence) means exactly.

The three routes that lead to modelo 210

The same form serves three very different situations, and it tells them apart with an income type code that you do not get to choose: it follows from what you do with the property.

The three cases can live together in the same year and in the same property, and that is where the quietest mistake in this market sits. Article 85.1 of the IRPF Law excludes from imputation any property that generates capital income: the months the flat was let go through rental income (type 01 or 35, with its own deadline) and only the days it was at your disposal generate imputed income (type 02). A calculation that imputes the whole year on a flat let for six months over-declares, and nothing anywhere returns an error.

The rest of this guide is about the mass case, the one that touches almost every foreign owner on the Costa Blanca, in the Balearics, the Canaries or Malaga: the imputed income of a property that is not let out.

Imputed income, properly explained

The law presumes that an urban property at your disposal produces income even though you charge nothing for it. The chain of references has three links: article 24.5 of the IRNR Law points to article 87 of the 2004 consolidated IRPF text, and the seventeenth additional provision of Law 35/2006 orders those references to be read as made to the law in force. That is, to article 85 of Law 35/2006.

That article 85.1 sets the base imponible (the taxable base) like this:

• 2% of the valor catastral, as the general rule, in proportion to the number of days involved.
• 1.1% if the cadastral values of the municipality were revised, modified or determined through a general collective valuation procedure that took effect in the tax period or in the ten preceding ones.
• 1.1% of 50% of the higher of two values (the one checked by the Administration for the purposes of other taxes, and the acquisition price or value) if at the accrual date the property has no cadastral value or it has not been notified to the owner.

One warning that saves an argument: you may read elsewhere that the 1.1% applies to any cadastral revision in force since 1 January 2012. That was what the fifty-fifth additional provision of the Spanish income tax law said, and today that provision covers the 2023 tax period only. It was extended three times by royal decree-law and Congress struck down all three (Resolutions of 22 January 2025, 27 January 2026 and 26 February 2026, which set aside Royal Decree-Laws 9/2024, 16/2025 and 2/2026). From 2024 onwards what governs is therefore the ten-year moving window of article 85.1: for income accrued in 2025 the 1.1% reaches revisions in force since 1 January 2015, and for 2026, since 1 January 2016. If your municipality revised its values between 2012 and 2015, this decides whether you pay half or double, so check the criterion the tax office publishes for the year you are filing before you file.

Two terms to pin down here. The valor catastral is the value the Catastro, the Spanish property register kept for tax purposes, assigns to each property; it is not the price you paid and not the market price. And the IBI (Impuesto sobre Bienes Inmuebles) is the annual property tax your town hall charges: its receipt is where you read the valor catastral, and it has to be the one for the year you are declaring. The fact that decides between 1.1% and 2%, the year of the last general collective valuation in your municipality, is not in the Catastro's public API: whoever hands you a figure should tell you which percentage they applied and why.

A full example: a flat with a valor catastral of €90,000 in a municipality revised in 2019, owned by a married couple resident in Germany, 50% each, for the whole of 2025.

Change one input and everything changes. With no revision in the ten preceding years the percentage would be 2%: €1,800 of imputed income and €171 of tax per spouse, almost double. Resident outside the EU, at 24%, each of them would pay €118.80. And if they had bought on 1 October 2025, only 92 of the 365 days are imputed: 990 × 92 / 365 = €249.53 of income and €23.71 of tax per spouse.

Not every property imputes. Article 85.1 leaves out undeveloped land, property assigned to economic activities, property generating capital income and the main home, and it estimates no income at all on property under construction or on property that, for planning reasons, cannot be used. Article 85.3 leaves out timeshare rights of two weeks a year or less. And article 13.1.h) of the IRNR Law excludes rural property: only urban property counts here.

One decisive date: imputed income accrues on 31 December each year (article 27.1.c of the IRNR Law). Someone who buys on 30 December imputes two days; someone who sells on 2 January imputes two days of the following year.

The rate: 24% as a rule, 19% if you live in the EU or the EEA

The tipo impositivo (the tax rate) is in article 25.1.a) of the IRNR Law and it is literal: as a general rule, 24 por 100, 24 percent; 19 por ciento, 19 percent, when the taxpayer is resident in another Member State of the European Union or of the European Economic Area with which there is an effective exchange of tax information.

The condition is not "being European": it is residing in the EU, or in an EEA State that meets the information exchange requirement. The Agencia Tributaria publishes the specific list in its non-residents manual, and that is where the three surprises of this market show up.

The United Kingdom stopped being a Member State in 2021, so the British owner, the largest group on the Spanish coast, went from 19% to 24%. Nothing landed on the doormat to announce it: the rate on your flat changed by operation of the article above. Switzerland has never been part of the European Economic Area, so a Swiss resident has always been at 24%. And Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein, which are not in the EU, do get the 19%.

On expenses you have to be precise. Article 24.6 lets residents in the EU and the EEA with effective exchange deduct expenses, but its wording ties them to "the determination of the taxable base corresponding to rendimientos", the income streams such as rent, and imputed income is not a rendimiento: it is the imputed income of article 13.1.h). A resident of Germany with an empty flat deducts nothing: they pay 19% on 1.1% or 2% of the valor catastral. The base is taken at its full amount and with no reductions (article 24.1), and only donations and withholdings are deducted from the tax due (article 26).

And a closing warning: having a convenio de doble imposición (a double taxation treaty) with Spain does not get you out of this tax. Treaties drafted along the OECD model say that income from immovable property "may be taxed" in the State where the property is located, and they extend that rule to direct use, which is exactly the case of imputed income. It is shared taxation: Spain charges, and your country of residence relieves the double taxation on its side. Look at your own country's treaty, because each one has its own wording.

The rule that multiplies the bill: one 210 per property, per co-owner and per year

This is the part almost nobody tells you in advance, and it is the one that decides how much paperwork you have ahead of you. Imputed income from property cannot be grouped.

Article 2.1.b) of Order EHA/3316/2010 allows several items of income of the same taxpayer to be grouped only if they share the income type code, come from the same payer, carry the same tax rate and, on top of that, "where they derive from an asset or a right, come from the same asset or right". Imputed income derives from the property, so two properties do not fit in the same return. The IRNR Law itself confirms it from another angle: article 28 bis.1 says a draft return will be generated for each property that gives rise to imputed real estate income. And article 27.4 of the General Tax Law closes the circle on the year side: each late self-assessment must expressly identify its period and contain only the data of that period.

On top of that, every co-owner is a separate taxpayer. Article 85.2 of the IRPF Law refers to article 11.3, which attributes the assets held in common by a married couple half to each spouse, unless a different ownership share is proved. Each of them declares their half, on their own return.

Multiply it out and this is what comes out:

The unit that counts is the referencia catastral, the code that identifies each property in the Catastro, not the deed and not the building. If the garage has a cadastral reference of its own, which it normally does when a separate IBI receipt arrives, it is a different asset with its own valor catastral and its own return. If it shares the reference with the home as an inseparable annex, it is one asset and one 210.

And a warning that costs money in the opposite direction: two spouses who each declare "my house" at 100% pay twice the real tax, with two payments made, and no system will warn them. The ownership shares declared have to add up to 100%.

Deadlines: when each thing falls due

The law sets no deadline at all: article 28.1 says the return is filed "in the manner, place and time limits laid down", and the ones that lay them down are the ministerial orders governing the form. Order HAC/623/2026, published in the BOE, Spain's official gazette, of 23 June 2026, reordered both things, the form and the deadlines, and it is worth understanding that they run on different axes.

The two axes. The new form governs every self-assessment filed from 1 January 2027, whichever year you are declaring. The new deadlines, in contrast, govern by accrual. Translated: imputed income for 2025 filed in November 2026 goes on the previous form; that same income filed in 2027 would go on the new form, and it would already be out of time.

The deadline depends on the result, not only on the type of income. The same fact, in the same box, has a different cut-off date depending on whether it comes out as tax to pay, as zero or as a refund. A change in one figure can move the due date, so you do the numbers first and look at the calendar afterwards, never the other way round.

And the date that matters today: if you own a property in Spain that in 2025 was empty or for your own use, the return for that imputed income falls due on 31 December 2026. That window is open right now.

How to file and pay without a NIE and without a digital certificate

This is where most owners get stuck: no NIE (Número de Identidad de Extranjero, the identification number Spain issues to foreigners), no certificado digital (the digital certificate used to sign filings online), and no way to register for Cl@ve (the AEAT's identification system) from outside Spain. There is a way through, and it is written into the rules.

Article 14 of Order EHA/3316/2010 governs the predeclaración, the pre-filing route: you complete the form on the sede electrónica (the AEAT's official website for procedures), you get the payment document and you pay it, with no certificate and no Cl@ve. And if you have no Spanish NIF (the Spanish tax identification number), the form itself issues a Código Identificativo, an identifying code (article 14.1.º.b), which acts as your identifier for that return. You do not need a NIE in order to comply.

Paying by transfer from your bank abroad has four traps, and all four have a tax consequence:

• The payment identifier expires after 30 calendar days. Once it has, you have to generate another one.
• The reference on the transfer must carry only that identifier. No names, no addresses, no references of your own.
• It is rejected if the transfer leaves a bank that collaborates with the AEAT, which means a Spanish bank. It has to leave your bank outside Spain.
• The filing date is set by the credit to the restricted account, not by the instruction you give. Someone who orders the transfer on 30 December can end up out of time.

The other route is domiciliación, direct debit. Since 1 February 2024, Order HFP/387/2023 accepts a direct debit on an account at a non-collaborating institution in the SEPA area, which is 36 countries and includes the United Kingdom and Switzerland. It requires you to file online within the first part of the window, which is shorter than the general one.

From that comes the golden rule of the calendar: there are three different dates, and mixing them up makes you late. The filing deadline, the direct debit deadline (shorter) and the date the money is taken from your account. The step by step, with the screens and the exact order, is in the guide on how to pay modelo 210 from abroad.

You have not filed for years: what happens and how you get out of it

It is the most common situation among foreign owners and it is not a disaster: there is a defined way out, with numbers you can know in advance. The key is who takes the first step.

If you file on your own initiative, before anyone asks you to, what applies is the recargo por declaración extemporánea, the surcharge for filing late, in article 27.2 of the General Tax Law: 1% plus another 1% for each full month of delay, on the amount to be paid. Past 12 months, the surcharge is 15% and late payment interest is added from the day after the end of that twelfth month. And there is a discount: article 27.5 reduces the surcharge by 25% if you pay all the rest on time. There is no penalty on this route.

If the requerimiento, the formal demand from the tax office, arrives before your return does, you are no longer in article 27, which keeps that regime for whoever puts things right on their own initiative. What opens instead is the route of the sanción tributaria, the tax penalty, together with the assessment and its interest. That is exactly the difference between a predictable surcharge and a penalty procedure, and a couple of weeks of head start decide it.

On how many years you have to put right: the Administration's right to assess lapses after four years (article 66.a of the General Tax Law). And each year goes on its own self-assessment: article 27.4 requires every late return to expressly identify its period and contain only its own data. Five years unfiled, with one property and one owner, are not five groupable returns: they are five separate returns, and if the property has two co-owners, ten.

You can estimate the surcharge for each year with the late filing surcharge calculator. With the size of tax bill a flat or a garage produces, the surcharge is usually a few euros a year: it almost always works out much cheaper to put things right than to wait.

Doing it yourself, or having it done for you

With what is in this guide you can do it on your own, and that is a perfectly reasonable choice: you look up the valor catastral on the IBI receipt, you find out whether your municipality revised its values in the last ten years, you apply 1.1% or 2%, you pro-rate by days if it was not yours all year, you split it by ownership share, you apply 19% or 24%, and you fill in one return per property, per co-owner and per tax year. The only genuinely awkward step is the year of the municipality's collective valuation, because it is not public data on the Catastro's site.

If you would rather have the calculation and the form handed to you done, that is exactly what kontora offers, with a flat price per return and the count of returns in front of you before you pay anything. You can see the detail on the modelo 210 service page and on pricing.

Frequently asked questions

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