Malaga tourist rentals: Only half of properties on Junta register are active on three main platforms

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Owners are 'banking' licences in anticipation of stricter regulations, while new national registration rules are blocking others from advertising on Airbnb

Cristina Vallejo

Wednesday, 11 February 2026, 12:41

Only half of the tourist properties in Malaga province registered with the Andalusian regional government (Junta) are actually operational.

According to the Junta's data, there are 85,137 tourist dwellings in the province, but the National Institute of Statistics (Ine), which monitors the active properties in the market, is only able to detect 48,261, i.e. 56% of them.

This means that only half of these properties are on Airbnb, Booking.com or Vrbo. The discrepancy comes from the obligation to register a flat with the Junta if it is to be ever used for tourist purposes. Once registered, the property may or may not be available for renting. The register simply makes it legal for the owner to advertise it, whenever they want.

According to the Junta's calculations, up to 30% of registered properties are not on the market. In anticipation of restrictive regulations, some owners decide to register their property, either to be able to reserve this possibility for the future or to revalue its price in the event of a later sale.

In December 2025, the Ministry of Consumer Affairs fined Airbnb 64 million euros for advertising tourist accommodation without a licence.

What the institute of statistics says

The Ine also publishes figures on tourist lets, but they are not an official statistic, only an experimental one designed to estimate how many tourist properties exist. The data comes from "web scraping" - automatically collecting information from public listings on major platforms.

Ine analysts then use algorithms to remove duplicate listings, as the same property often appears on more than one platform. A University of Valencia geographer describes the method as somewhat convoluted, likening it to "legal hacking", as it gathers data from open websites without accessing private or paid content.

Even so, Professor De la Osada says that this is currently the best available statistic for measuring how many tourist properties are on the market, despite its limitations.

One minor drawback is the low precision of the maps produced from the data: they only reach census-tract level, partly to protect owners' anonymity and partly because the Ine cannot technically provide more detailed information.

The main limitation, however, is that the sample only covers the three main platforms: Airbnb, Booking and Vrbo. On the one hand, the Ine does capture properties that operate without being registered, which can inflate its figures compared with the regional government's official register. On the other, it misses homes advertised on smaller platforms or rented through more informal, local channels.

Alternative platforms

Malaga has a large influx of foreigners. According to the Ine, this means that there might be some tourist properties advertised by foreign platforms, relevant to the residents of a specific country. However, the bulk of properties are to be found on big platforms, so the Ine statistics still provide the most realistic picture.

There are twice as many tourist properties registered as those marketed on holiday rental platforms in coastal municipalities

The regional government recognises that up to 30% of the properties registered in the Andalusian registry are not operational or are only put on the market at very specific times. A percentage that is easily applicable to coastal areas and major urban destinations, as is the case of the Costa del Sol and Malaga city.

There are twice as many tourist properties registered as those marketed on holiday rental platforms in municipalities such as Marbella, Torremolinos, Benalmádena, Estepona, Fuengirola, Mijas and Benahavís. In other places, such as Jaén, the shortage of accommodation has pushed all registered properties to also be present on advertising platforms.

The government's single register restricts the permission to advertise and limits profits

President of the association of tourist properties in Andalucía (AVVA-Pro) Juan Cubo says many owners may also not be advertising their properties because they have them registered with the Junta but not in the single register that the central government implemented in July last year. This bans them from advertising on big platforms and lead to loss of profits.

Professor De la Osada says that the Junta should be able to deregister dwellings that have not been in operation for some time and keep the registry up to date. "It would be interesting, because from a statistical point of view, having information on the renewal of these lists promotes credibility," he says.