Sanxenxo concentrates large share of tourist flats

Spain’s Supreme Court has voided the national registry that short-term rental hosts needed to obtain a state registration number before advertising on platforms such as Airbnb, Booking or Idealista, according to reporting published on May 21 and official statistical sources. Before the ruling, 3,829 tourism or seasonal rental listings in Galicia had already been marked for removal from platforms because they had not secured that code. The decision leaves in place the digital one-stop system and the obligation for platforms to send data to the administration, but it removes a layer that had overlapped with regional registries. In Galicia, the change lands just as the region heads toward the summer tourism peak. ### How many tourist flats are we actually talking about in Galicia? Galicia had 27,759 registered viviendas de uso turístico, or tourist-use homes, in May 2026 in the regional Register of Tourism Companies and Activities, known as REAT. That was part of a broader stock of 32,218 tourist accommodation establishments in the region, according to Turismo de Galicia data cited by Faro de Vigo. Tourist-use homes therefore represented 86.2% of all accommodation establishments in the regional register and 48.7% of tourist places, the report said. (farodevigo.es) The National Statistics Institute, or INE, showed a smaller number on online platforms. INE’s experimental measure, based on web scraping from the three most-used accommodation platforms in Spain and then deduplicated, counted 15,236 tourist homes advertised in Galicia in November 2025, down 22.6% from a year earlier. Capacity fell to 80,227 places from 104,386, a drop of 23.14%, according to the figures cited by Faro de Vigo and the INE methodology note. (farodevigo.es) ### Why do the Xunta and INE totals differ so much? INE says its statistic measures homes found on major platforms through web scraping, then filters and deduplicates them under each region’s rules. That means it is tracking active online supply, not the full stock of homes registered with a regional government. Turismo de Galicia’s REAT directory, by contrast, is an administrative register updated monthly from filings and entries made in the regional tourism registry. (farodevigo.es) Faro de Vigo said that distinction is central to understanding the impact of the now-void state registry: one figure captures homes enrolled with the Xunta, while the other captures homes actively advertised online. (ine.es) ### Where is the concentration strongest? Pontevedra province holds 44.1% of Galicia’s viviendas de uso turístico, according to the figures cited in the underlying reporting for this story. Within that concentration, Sanxenxo stands out: the municipality accounts for 11.4% of Galicia’s tourist accommodation places, making it one of the clearest local centers of short-term rental capacity in the region. (datos.gob.es) Sanxenxo has also been posting high occupancy in the segment. Aviturga, the Association of Tourist Homes of Galicia, said tourist-use homes in Sanxenxo were close to 80% occupied during Easter, in line with the broader Rías Baixas area. That gives a recent indication of how heavily the municipality depends on this part of the accommodation market ahead of the main summer season. (farodevigo.es) ### What exactly did the court ruling change for hosts and platforms? The Supreme Court ruling nullified the state registry because it overlapped with regional registries, Faro de Vigo reported. The same report said platforms had been required to withdraw listings that lacked the state short-term rental registration number, even when owners had applied and been rejected for not meeting the ministry’s requirements. Galicia ranked sixth among Spain’s regions by rejected registrations, according to the article. (diariodepontevedra.es) The digital one-stop window and the requirement for platforms to transmit data to the administration remain in force, the report said. For hosts in Galicia, that means the state code has fallen away, but the regional registration framework and platform reporting obligations still matter. ### What should readers watch next? Turismo de Galicia published its latest REAT accommodation directory for May 2026 on May 13, and the INE continues to update its experimental tourist-housing tables on a twice-yearly reference cycle now set to May and November. (farodevigo.es) Those two data series will show whether Galicia’s platform listings recover after the court ruling and whether Sanxenxo and Pontevedra keep increasing their share of the region’s tourist-flat market. (aei.turismo.gal)