The 3% retention when selling as a non-resident: how to get it back

You sign the sale of your apartment in Fuengirola for €335,000. You leave the notary’s office with a cheque for €324,950 and one question: where are the other €10,050? The buyer explains that he is keeping them for the Spanish Tax Agency, that this is «the 3% retention», and that you will get them back. Nobody tells you when, who files what, or that the money does not come back on its own.

That €10,050 is not a tax. It is a payment on account of a tax that has not been calculated yet. The actual tax may turn out to be €1,456, €15,000 or nothing at all. The retention is always the same percentage of the price, whether you made money or lost it. It is a security deposit the Spanish State collects in advance, because once a non-resident has been paid and has left the country, collecting from them is hard.

The practical consequence is that in most Costa del Sol sales the retention and the tax do not match, and you have to claim the difference back. It does not arrive in the post: you file a tax form, within a specific deadline and with specific documents, and many refunds get stuck for a year because of mistakes made on signing day.

This guide covers who withholds and with which form, the exact deadlines, what happens if the buyer fails to withhold, how to claim the refund, how long it really takes and what delays it, what happens when you sell at a loss, and how all of this interacts with the municipal land value tax. The detailed capital gains calculation lives in our guide to selling a property on the Costa del Sol as a non-resident.

What the 3% retention actually is

Spain’s Non-Resident Income Tax — Impuesto sobre la Renta de no Residentes, or IRNR — taxes what you earn in Spain even if you live elsewhere. When you sell a property located on Spanish soil, the gain is taxed here whether you are tax resident in Munich, Manchester or Miami. The legislator’s problem is not the rule, it is collection: a non-resident seller can be paid, close their Spanish bank account and disappear before any assessment exists. The solution is to shift onto the buyer the duty to deduct a percentage of the price and pay it to the Treasury on the seller’s behalf. That money enters the system with your name on it: it is a payment on account of your tax, not the buyer’s.

Who withholds, and on what

The obligation falls on the buyer, resident or not, individual or company. It is not the notary’s job and not the estate agent’s. In practice the buyer’s gestoría — the administrative agency that handles Spanish paperwork — carries it out, but the legal responsibility is the buyer’s. That has an uncomfortable consequence for you: you do not control the procedure your refund depends on.

The base is the agreed consideration: the price stated in the escritura, the public deed signed before the notary. No deduction for costs, none for the mortgage being redeemed. If you own the property jointly, each seller is assessed separately: where one co-owner is a Spanish tax resident and the other is not, the 3% applies only to the non-resident’s share. Couples owning 50/50 where one partner now files as a Spanish resident are where over-withholding happens most often, simply out of habit.

Price on the deed	3% retention	What you receive at signing	Gain above which the retention falls short
€180,000	€5,400	€174,600	€28,400
€250,000	€7,500	€242,500	€39,500
€335,000	€10,050	€324,950	€52,900
€475,000	€14,250	€460,750	€75,000
€913,000	€27,390	€885,610	€144,200

That last column is the calculation almost nobody does, and the one that decides whether you will be paid or will have to pay. With a 19% rate on the gain and a 3% retention on the price, the break-even point is a gain equal to 15.8% of the sale price. If you bought three or four years ago you are probably below it; if you bought in 2013 or 2014, at the bottom of the cycle, almost certainly above it.

When no retention is due

The regulations set out exactly two exceptions, and the list is closed:

• The seller proves they are subject to Spanish personal or corporate income tax, by means of a certificate issued by the competent body of the Spanish tax authority. Note what this is not: not a padrón town-hall registration, not a residency card. The difference between administrative residence and tax residence is worth thousands of euros here.
• The property is contributed to the incorporation or capital increase of a company resident in Spain.

Otherwise, the retention applies. Three beliefs worth dismantling: selling at a loss does not exempt you, having a NIE does not exempt you, and leaving the money in a Spanish account does not exempt you. A private agreement in which the buyer accepts not to withhold does not bind the tax authority and leaves the property charged with the debt.

Form 211: the buyer’s filing

Form 211 is titled «Retention on the acquisition of real estate from non-residents without a permanent establishment», and one is filed per property acquired. It matters to you for two reasons: the deadline and the copy.

Element	Form 211 (buyer)	Form 210 (seller)
Who files it	The buyer, resident or not	The non-resident seller
What it declares	3% of the price as a payment on account	The actual capital gain or loss
Deadline	One month from the date of transfer	Three months once that month has elapsed
Calculation base	Agreed consideration (the price)	Transfer value minus acquisition value
Possible outcome	Always a payment	Payable, refundable or nil
Key document	The «copy for the non-resident transferor»	Filing receipt

One month from the deed, not from payment

The filing and payment deadline is one month from the date of transfer, which is the date of the public deed — even if payment was deferred, even if part of the price is held back to guarantee the cancellation of charges, and even if the cheque is cashed later.

It is a short deadline, and it is missed often when the buyer is also foreign and has no Spanish gestoría. If he files late he faces a surcharge, but the side effect is yours: your refund is frozen until the retention shows as paid in the system.

The «copy for the transferor»

Form 211 is produced in several copies and one of them is yours. The official instructions are unambiguous: once payment has been made, the buyer hands that copy to the seller, who will use it to evidence the payment on account when filing their own return. It is the proof behind the box where you deduct the retention.

This is the most expensive operational mistake of the whole transaction: the buyer leaves, you leave, and nobody asks for the copy. Months later you have neither the receipt number nor the buyer’s contact details. The fix is contractual. Write into the arras — the Spanish preliminary deposit contract — and repeat in the deed the buyer’s obligation to send you a copy of the filed Form 211 within five days of payment. It costs one line and saves a year.

What happens if the buyer does not withhold

The law does not merely penalise the buyer. If the retention is not paid over, the transferred property is charged with the lesser of that retention or the corresponding tax. The debt attaches to the property and follows it into whoever’s hands it passes. And it is not a hidden charge: the regulations require the Land Registrar to record it in the margin of the entry, stating the amount for which the property answers. Anyone requesting a nota simple, the standard Land Registry extract, will see it.

• For the buyer it is a liability that surfaces when he tries to resell or mortgage. No bank lends comfortably against a property with a registered charge.
• For you it is not a release. You remain the taxpayer: you still file Form 210 and pay whatever is due, only now with no payment on account to deduct.
• For the transaction it is a source of litigation, because the buyer usually turns round and claims from the seller whatever he has had to cover.

So even though it stings on signing day, it is in your interest that the buyer withholds, and withholds properly. A sale without retention is not a sale where you walk away with more money. It is a sale with a deferred problem.

Form 210: how to claim the refund

Form 210 is the non-resident income tax return. It covers several things — the deemed income Spain charges you for simply having a second home available, the income from a long-term let — and one of them is declaring the gain on transferring a property. One is filed per transfer and per seller, under section 210 H with income type code 28, unless you claim the main-home reinvestment exemption, which has its own codes.

Four months from signing

The deadline is drafted in two stages, which is why it is constantly miscounted. The rule reads: three months once the one-month period from the date of transfer has elapsed. With a deed dated 15 January, the buyer’s month ends on 15 February and your deadline falls on 15 May, regardless of the outcome.

Two warnings. First, filing before the buyer has paid the 211 is counterproductive: the return arrives unsupported and the refund stalls. Second, if the result is a payment, leaving it to the last day is expensive, because surcharges for late filing begin the next morning.

If the result is a refund, filing late carries no surcharge — there is no debt to surcharge — but it delays payment and runs the risk of the four-year limitation period. A refund left unclaimed for four years is lost, and that is not a theoretical scenario: it happens every year with heirs who had no idea the deceased had a retention outstanding.

What you need before filing

• Your NIE, exactly as it appears on the original certificate. The NIE — Número de Identidad de Extranjero — is the foreigner’s identification number Spain issues to anyone buying property here, and it is what the Tax Agency uses to match your Form 210 against the buyer’s Form 211. One wrong character breaks the match. If you obtained yours remotely, our guide to buying property in Spain without travelling explains how to check it.
• The Form 211 copy with its receipt number, and both deeds, purchase and sale.
• Evidence of the costs and taxes on purchase: the transfer tax or VAT you paid when buying, notary, Land Registry and gestoría fees.
• Invoices for improvements, with VAT itemised, in your name and with traceable payment. A renovation can add tens of thousands of euros to your acquisition value, but only if it is documented.
• Invoices from the sale: agency commission, energy performance certificate, and the municipal land value tax receipt if you bore it.
• A tax residence certificate from your country if you are claiming a double taxation treaty. It must state that you are resident within the meaning of the treaty, and it expires after one year.
• Your bank details and evidence of account ownership, which is compulsory to attach on refund returns.

What adds and what subtracts

Item	Where it goes	Condition
Price paid on purchase	Adds to acquisition value	As stated on the deed
Transfer tax or VAT on purchase	Adds to acquisition value	Proof of payment
Notary, registry and gestoría on purchase	Adds to acquisition value	Invoice in your name
Improvement and extension works	Adds to acquisition value	Invoice with VAT, traceable payment
Depreciation if it was ever let	Subtracts from acquisition value	The minimum applies whether or not you claimed it
Maintenance and repair works	Does not count	Painting, fixing a fault, like-for-like replacement
Furniture and appliances	Does not count	Not part of the property
Agency commission	Subtracts from transfer value	Invoice with VAT in your name
Energy performance certificate	Subtracts from transfer value	Invoice
Municipal land value tax borne by you	Subtracts from transfer value	Proof of payment
Interest on your mortgage	Does not count	A financing cost, not an acquisition cost

The border between improvement and maintenance causes the most arguments. An improvement adds floor area, increases habitability or extends the useful life: legally enclosing a terrace, installing ducted air conditioning, replacing external window frames. Repainting or swapping a broken appliance does not. And an invoice without itemised VAT, not in your name, or paid in cash is one you will not be able to defend.

If you ever let it, your acquisition value drops

This is the detail that catches most sellers out, because it works the opposite way to what feels logical. If the property was rented out or used for a business activity, the acquisition value is reduced by depreciation, and the minimum depreciation is applied in any case, whether or not you ever claimed it: 3% a year on the higher of acquisition cost or cadastral value, excluding the land element in both.

In numbers: if the building element of the example apartment is worth €160,800 and it was let for five years, that is €24,120 off the acquisition value. The gain rises by that amount and the tax by €4,582.80. Put bluntly, the years you rented the property out cost you twice — once in the annual non-resident tax and again when you sell. That is not a reason to leave it empty; the yield usually more than compensates, as our comparison of holiday lets versus long-term rentals shows. But it is a reason not to calculate your expected refund as if the flat had stood empty.

The 19% does not change because you live outside the EU

This is the most widespread confusion in forums and even in some law offices, and it matters to British and American owners in particular. The claim is that an EU non-resident pays 19% and everyone else pays 24%. That is not true for gains on property transfers. Spanish law has two separate rules: the general rate is 24%, dropping to 19% for residents of the EU, Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein — but gains arising from transfers of assets have their own 19% rate, with no distinction by country of residence.

Type of income	Resident in the EU, Iceland, Norway or Liechtenstein	Resident elsewhere
Gain on selling the property	19%	19%
Rental income	19%, with deductible expenses	24%, on gross income with no deductions
Deemed income on a second home	19%	24%

Where residence really hurts is in letting, not in selling. A British owner pays 24% on gross rental income, unable to deduct community fees, council tax or insurance — one of the Brexit consequences that most changed the numbers, covered in our guide to moving to the Costa del Sol from the UK. But on the day they sell, a Briton and a German pay the same.

Two dating rules close the calculation. First, there is no inflation adjustment: the indexation coefficients were abolished for transfers made from 1 January 2015, so if you bought in 1998 your acquisition value is in 1998 euros. Second, the pre-1995 taper relief coefficients are still alive for anyone who acquired before 31 December 1994, and they apply to non-residents too, subject to a cumulative €400,000 limit of transfer value since 2015. The full calculation, including the main-home reinvestment exemption for EU and European Economic Area residents, is set out in the companion article on selling as a non-resident on the Costa del Sol.

The full case, euro by euro

Ingrid is tax resident in Germany and non-resident in Spain. In 2021 she bought an 84 m² apartment near Los Boliches beach, in Fuengirola, for €268,000. In 2023 she fitted a new kitchen and bathroom. She never let it out. In March 2026 she sells for €335,000.

Item	Amount
Purchase price on the deed (2021)	€268,000.00
Andalusian transfer tax at 7%	€18,760.00
Notary	€1,100.00
Land Registry	€650.00
Gestoría	€450.00
Kitchen and bathroom refit (2023), invoiced	€14,500.00
Acquisition value	€303,460.00
Sale price on the deed (2026)	€335,000.00
Agency commission, 5% plus VAT	−€20,267.50
Energy performance certificate	−€180.00
Municipal land value tax borne by the seller	−€1,980.00
Legal and tax advice on the sale	−€1,450.00
Transfer value	€311,122.50
Capital gain	€7,662.50
Non-resident income tax at 19%	€1,455.88
Retention paid via Form 211 (3% of €335,000)	−€10,050.00
Form 210 result: refund due	€8,594.12

The numbers that matter, said out loud: Ingrid had €10,050 withheld and her actual tax was €1,455.88. The retention was seven times the tax she owed. The €8,594.12 difference is hers, but she only gets it if she files Form 210 on time and with the evidence in hand.

It is worth seeing what happens without paperwork. Without the refit invoices, the acquisition value drops to €288,960, the gain rises to €22,162.50, the tax becomes €4,210.88 and the refund falls to €5,839.12. The folder of invoices for a €14,500 renovation is worth €2,755.

And look at the timeline of the money. Ingrid receives €324,950 at the March 2026 signing, the buyer pays the €10,050 in April, she files Form 210 in May, and the refund lands somewhere between August 2026 and March 2027. That gap is what nobody plans for: if the proceeds are committed to another purchase, count on the 3% being unavailable for the better part of a year.

The three possible outcomes

Same apartment, same sale price and same costs, changing only the year and price of purchase. The outcome does not depend on what you sell, but on what you bought:

	Bought 2021 for €268,000	Bought 2015 for €195,000	Bought 2007 for €340,000
Acquisition value	€303,460	€230,950	€366,150
Transfer value	€311,122.50	€311,122.50	€311,122.50
Gain or loss	+€7,662.50	+€80,172.50	−€55,027.50
Tax at 19%	€1,455.88	€15,232.78	€0
3% retention	€10,050	€10,050	€10,050
Form 210 result	Refund of €8,594.12	Pay a further €5,182.78	Refund of €10,050

The middle column surprises anyone who bought cheaply: after having €10,050 withheld, they still owe €5,182.78 more. If you bought between 2012 and 2016 in Torremolinos, Benalmádena or Mijas, this is the likely scenario: set the difference aside on signing day.

When the Tax Agency refunds, and how long it really takes

The authority has six months from the end of the filing period to make the refund. If your deadline was 15 May, the clock starts there, not on the day you filed; if you filed late, it runs from the filing date. Once those six months pass, the amount accrues late-payment interest without the taxpayer having to request it. The rate is set annually by the State Budget Act; with the 2026 Budget not yet approved, the 4.0625% rate remains in force, which on the example’s €8,594.12 is roughly €349 for a year’s delay.

Be realistic, though: six months is the point at which the authority starts paying interest, not a promise to pay within six months. The Tax Agency does not publish average processing times for this form, so we are not going to invent a figure. What we do observe in the transactions we handle is that a clean file is paid three to eight months after filing, and that with information requests in the middle it stretches to twelve or eighteen. That is an observation about our own portfolio, not an official statistic.

The difference between three months and eighteen is almost never luck. It is usually one of these five things:

1. The Form 211 does not show as paid. The refund halts until the buyer regularises. Avoided by requiring a copy of the 211 by contract.
2. A mistyped NIE. The 210 does not match the 211 and the system cannot see the retention. Copy it from the original certificate, letters and check digit included.
3. An unevidenced bank account, or one whose holder is not exactly the seller.
4. Information requests nobody answers, because they are served in Spain and the seller has gone. The file is then closed.
5. Invoices that do not prove what they claim to: no itemised VAT, in someone else’s name, or paid in cash.

Your bank account: yes, you can be paid outside Spain

The natural reflex after selling is to close the Spanish account. That is exactly what not to do: keep it open in your name until the refund has been received. It costs a few euros a month and avoids the most frustrating outcome of all, where the Tax Agency agrees the refund, issues the payment order, and it bounces because the account no longer exists.

That said, a widely repeated myth needs correcting: the Spanish Tax Agency does refund to accounts held outside Spain. The Form 210 instructions say so explicitly, with one condition about the account holder:

• If the holder is the taxpayer themselves, the account may be held in Spain or abroad.
• If the holder is someone else involved in the return — a jointly liable party, a withholder or an authorised legal representative — the account must be held in Spain.

The small print is documentary: you must attach evidence identifying the account and proving ownership. That is where the foreign route gets stuck, because a statement in another language that does not clearly identify the holder triggers an information request. A Spanish account is not a legal requirement; it is simply the path of least friction.

The fiscal representative: when it is required and when it merely helps

Plenty of advisers sell fiscal representation as a universal legal requirement. It is not. Spanish law requires you to appoint a representative when you are not resident in an EU state, nor in a European Economic Area state with mutual assistance rules, and one of these also applies: you operate through a permanent establishment, certain specific cases in the law itself, or the authority expressly requires it given the amount and nature of the income or your ownership of property in Spain. Failure to comply carries a €2,000 penalty, rising to €6,000 for jurisdictions without effective exchange of information.

For an individual resident in the European Union selling an apartment, there is no obligation to appoint a fiscal representative. You may appoint a voluntary attorney, which is a different thing, and it usually pays: information requests are served in Spain with deadlines of ten or fifteen working days, and an unanswered file is closed. A gestoría handling the Form 210 and chasing the refund typically charges €250 to €600 depending on complexity and the number of sellers; that is a range from our own practice, not an official tariff. Against a five-figure refund, it is one of the easiest decisions in the transaction.

Selling at a loss: withheld anyway, reclaimed in full

This is where most money goes unclaimed on this coast. The retention admits no exception for losses: the buyer cannot decide not to withhold because you show him your 2007 deed. It is withheld, it is paid over, and then it is recovered. If the outcome is a capital loss, the tax is nil and the refund is 100% of what was withheld. The form’s own instructions confirm it: where there are losses, the return must still be filed if you wish to exercise the right to a refund of the retention. Same deadline, same mechanics.

Three profiles leave that money on the table with striking regularity:

1. Those who assume that with no tax there is nothing to file. It is the other way round: no return, no refund.
2. Those selling an inherited home. The acquisition value is the one declared for inheritance tax plus the costs of the estate, not what the deceased paid in 1985. If the estate was valued high, the later gain is small or negative and the refund large.
3. Those selling below what they paid at the peak of the last cycle. Such sales still exist, especially in inland developments and on the second line of large urbanisations.

The only way to genuinely lose that refund is to let four years pass. Within that window, even if you missed the four-month deadline, the return can be filed and the refund collected.

Plusvalía municipal: the other tax in the way

The plusvalía municipal — formally, the tax on the increase in value of urban land — is a separate tax, levied by the town hall rather than the state, with its own deadline and its own calculation. It crosses paths with the retention at two points.

The buyer becomes substitute taxpayer

As a rule the seller pays this tax. But where the seller is a non-resident individual, the local finance law makes the buyer the substitute taxpayer: he is the one who must declare and pay it to the town hall. The word «individual» is not decorative. If the seller is a non-resident company — a common structure for villas in Marbella and Estepona — there is no substitution and the selling company remains liable.

Being the substitute does not mean paying out of his own pocket: it means answering to the town hall and being able to pass the cost on to you. In practice it is settled by also holding back the estimated plusvalía at the notary’s office. Added to the 3%, you can see 4% or 5% of the price deducted on signing day. That double deduction is avoided by taking the calculated figure into the arras contract.

The two methods, and selling at a loss

• The objective method applies a coefficient to the cadastral value of the land based on the years elapsed. The maximums are set by the State and each town hall fixes its own within them. In 2026 the maximum, for periods of twenty years or more, is 0.40: Royal Decree-Law 16/2025 approved a lower table in December with effect from January 2026, but Parliament repealed it on 27 January 2026 and the change fell away.
• The real method applies at the taxpayer’s request where the actual increase is lower than the objective one. It compares transfer value with acquisition value and applies to the difference the proportion the cadastral land value bears to the total. Note the detail that changes the result: in this comparison costs and taxes are not counted.

And the point that matters most if you are selling at a loss: where it is established that there has been no increase in land value, the tax simply does not apply. You must evidence it with both deeds and declare it to the town hall even if the result is nil. The deadline for transfers between living persons is thirty working days from the deed — the first date in the whole calendar, and the one most often forgotten.

The link to Form 210 runs both ways. On one hand, the plusvalía you bear is deductible on Form 210 as a cost inherent to the transfer: in Ingrid’s case those €1,980 cut her tax by about €376. On the other, there is an asymmetry that surprises people: you can have a loss on Form 210 and an increase for plusvalía purposes at the same time, because the income tax deducts costs and taxes while the plusvalía compares deed values with nothing deducted. One tax does not decide the other. Ask the buyer for a copy of the municipal filing just as you ask for the Form 211: without proof of payment you cannot deduct it.

The full timetable

Time from the deed	Step	Who	Consequence of missing it
30 working days	Municipal land value tax	The buyer, as substitute	Town hall surcharge and interest
1 month	Form 211, the 3% retention	The buyer	Surcharge, and the property is charged with the debt
1 month and 5 days (by contract)	Buyer sends the Form 211 copy to the seller	The buyer	Blocks the seller’s refund
4 months	Form 210, capital gain	The seller	Surcharge if payable; delay if refundable
4 months + 6 months	End of the Tax Agency’s refund window	The Tax Agency	Late-payment interest accrues automatically
4 years	Limitation of the right to a refund	The seller	The refund is lost for good

Six mistakes that cost real money

1. Leaving the notary’s office without agreeing how the Form 211 copy will reach you. Cheap to prevent, expensive to fix.
2. Closing the Spanish bank account after selling. The payment order bounces.
3. Assuming a loss means nothing to file. No Form 210, no refund.
4. Hunting for renovation invoices in the month you file. In Ingrid’s case they were worth €2,755.
5. Spending the whole proceeds when the result will be payable. If you bought cheaply, the retention falls short.
6. Agreeing that the buyer skips the retention «to speed things up». Same tax liability, no payment on account, and a charge registered against the property.

How to recover the retention, step by step

1. Before putting the property on the market, find the purchase deed, the receipts for the taxes and costs of that transaction, and the invoices for improvements. If something is missing, there is still time to request copies from the notary or the contractor.
2. Estimate the outcome before you sign. Knowing whether you will collect €8,000 or pay €5,000 changes how you plan. Start with what your house is worth on the Costa del Sol and the difference between an appraisal, a market valuation and the cadastral value.
3. Put three clauses in the arras contract: the obligation to withhold 3%, the obligation to send you the Form 211 copy within five days of payment, and the agreed treatment of the plusvalía with its estimated amount.
4. Check your NIE against the original certificate and confirm it appears identically on the deed.
5. Appoint an attorney, or at least an address in Spain for service of notices, before you leave.
6. On signing day, check the retention is calculated on the right price and on your ownership share, not on the total if you are selling jointly with a Spanish resident.
7. After the first month, confirm the Form 211 has been paid and claim your copy. Do not file your Form 210 until you have it.
8. File Form 210 within the four months, with the sale costs gathered, entering the retention, income type code 28 and an account in your name with proof of ownership.
9. Keep the filing receipt and watch for notices. If six months after the deadline you have not been paid, the amount is already accruing interest.

If you have not settled on a price or a moment yet, the turnover figures by town in where property sells fastest on the Costa del Sol help you estimate how many months you will be on the market, and the breakdown in the cost of selling a property on the Costa del Sol puts numbers on the other costs that will reduce your Form 210.

Frequently asked questions

Who pays the 3% retention, the buyer or the seller?

The buyer pays it over, but the money is the seller’s: it is deducted from the price the seller receives. The buyer acts as withholder and files Form 211 within one month of the deed. For the non-resident seller it is a payment on account of their Spanish non-resident income tax, not an extra tax and not a cost borne by the buyer.

How long does it take to get the 3% retention back?

The Tax Agency has six months from the end of the Form 210 filing period, after which the refund accrues late-payment interest. In our experience a clean file is paid three to eight months after filing, and with information requests it can stretch to eighteen. Adding the four months to file, expect six months to a year and a half between signing and payment.

Do I get the 3% back if I sell at a loss?

Yes, in full. The retention applies even where there is a capital loss, because it is calculated on the price rather than the result. With no gain, the tax is nil and the refund is 100% of what was withheld. But you must still file Form 210: no return, no refund, however clear the loss.

What happens if the buyer does not withhold the 3%?

The property is charged with the lesser of the retention or the tax, and the Land Registrar records it in the margin of the entry, so the charge follows the property. The seller is not released: they must still file Form 210 and pay whatever is due, only now with no payment on account to deduct.

What is the deadline to file Form 210 after selling?

Three months once the one-month period from the date of transfer has elapsed: four months from the deed in total. The first month belongs to the buyer for the Form 211, and the seller should not file before that retention shows as paid. With a deed dated 15 January, the deadline is 15 May.

Can the refund be paid into an account in my own country?

Yes. The Form 210 instructions allow the account to be held in Spain or abroad provided the holder is the taxpayer themselves; a Spanish account is only required where the holder is a representative, a withholder or a jointly liable party. You must attach proof of account ownership, and that is where information requests add months.

Do I need a fiscal representative in Spain to reclaim the 3%?

If you live in the European Union and sell as an individual, no. The obligation arises when you live outside the EU and the European Economic Area and certain conditions apply, or when the authority expressly requires it; non-compliance carries a €2,000 penalty. Even so an attorney helps: notices are served in Spain and an unanswered file is closed.

Is the 3% calculated on the gain or on the price?

On the agreed consideration: the price on the deed, with no deduction for costs or for the mortgage being redeemed. That is why it rarely matches the tax. Since the gain is taxed at 19%, retention and tax break even when the gain is around 16% of the sale price; below that you get a refund, above it you top up.

Does a British or American seller pay 24% instead of 19%?

No. Gains arising from transfers of assets are taxed at 19% for any non-resident, whether they live in the European Union or outside it. The 24% is the general non-resident rate and applies to other income, such as rent and the deemed income on a second home. On selling, a Briton and a German pay the same.

Can I still claim the refund after the four months have passed?

Yes. Where the result is a refund there is no debt to surcharge, so late filing carries no penalty: it only delays payment. The limit is the four-year limitation period running from the end of the filing window. After that the refund is lost, which happens most often in inherited estates.

Keep reading

• Selling a property on the Costa del Sol as a non-resident
• The cost of selling a property on the Costa del Sol
• Taxes on buying property in Andalusia: transfer tax, VAT and hidden costs
• Buying property in Spain as a foreigner
• The ultimate guide to buying property on the Costa del Sol
• What €300,000 buys today in each Costa del Sol town

Sources and methodology

The retention derives from article 25.2 of the consolidated Non-Resident Income Tax Act (Royal Legislative Decree 5/2004), which sets the 3% on the agreed consideration and the charge over the transferred property for the lesser of the retention or the tax. The two exceptions, the one-month deadline and the Land Registrar’s marginal note are in article 14 of the implementing regulations (Royal Decree 1776/2004); the fiscal representative rules and penalties are in article 10. The 19% rate on gains from transfers of assets, with no distinction by country of residence, is in article 25.1.f) and appears as such in the Tax Agency’s published table of non-resident tax rates.

The Form 210 deadline, income type code 28, the delivery of the Form 211 copy to the seller, the refund bank account rules, the one-year validity of residence certificates and the duty to file even at a loss come from the official instructions to Forms 210 and 211 and from the Tax Agency’s Non-Resident Taxation Manual. The abolition of indexation coefficients from 2015, minimum depreciation and the pre-1995 taper relief come from the Tax Agency’s guidance on capital gains from transfers and from the ninth transitional provision of Act 35/2006. The six-month refund window rests on article 16.2 of the regulations, which refers to article 103 of Act 35/2006, and the automatic interest on article 31.2 of the General Tax Act. The 4.0625% rate remains in force because the 2026 State Budget had not been approved at the date of this update; if it is approved, the figure will need revisiting. Order HAC/623/2026 amended Forms 210 and 211, but its changes affect deemed income and rentals, not property transfers.

The municipal land value tax rules come from the consolidated Local Finance Act (Royal Legislative Decree 2/2004): the buyer as substitute taxpayer where the seller is a non-resident individual (article 106.2), the thirty working days (article 110.2), the dual calculation method introduced after Constitutional Court judgment 182/2021 (article 107) and the absence of a taxable event where there is no increase in value (article 104.5). The 0.40 maximum coefficient results from Royal Decree-Law 8/2023: the table in Royal Decree-Law 16/2025 fell away when Parliament repealed it on 27 January 2026. Each town hall sets its own coefficients within those maximums.

Average prices quoted as market context come from the SolProp Costa del Sol Price Index (v2026.3, data to June 2026). This is our own estimate built from asking prices and our own portfolio, and not a record of transactions: it is not data from the Land Registrars’ association or the National Statistics Institute and should not be compared directly with them, because they measure different things. The methodology is published in the interactive map methodology and the figures by area in the interactive Costa del Sol price map.

Ingrid’s case is a constructed example using real prices, rates and a real property type for the area, not the accounts of a specific transaction. The transfer tax rates used are those in force in Andalusia in the year of each purchase, not current ones. The €250 to €600 gestoría fees and the three-to-eighteen-month refund times are ranges observed in our own practice, not official tariffs or published statistics: the Tax Agency does not release average refund times for this form.

This article is general information and does not replace advice from a tax adviser or a lawyer for your specific case. Last updated: August 2026.