Anne Frank's "The Diary of a Young Girl" remains one of the most famous and powerful works of the 20th century — and one of the most poignant accounts of a young person's life during the Holocaust.
27.01.2025 - 15:25 / euronews.com / Pedro Sanchez / Joanna Bailey
Short-term rental booking platform Airbnb has hit back at Spanish restrictions on rental properties, stressing that they will have severe repercussions for both income and jobs.
Citing research undertaken by Oxford Economics in late 2024, Airbnb warns of 400,000 jobs being put at risk by the regulations, alongside almost €30 billion of income.
The Spanish government implemented new regulations on short-term rentals on 2 January. Any property owner wishing to rent out their house is now required to be registered in a national database and obtain a permit before they can list their property on booking platforms.
Accommodation providers are also required to collect sensitive personal information from their guests, including bank details and personal identifiers. Spain has also proposed to raise VAT on short-term rentals to match the 10 per cent paid by hotels.
Although it went live in January, the regulation won’t be fully enforced until 1 July. After that date, property owners risk fines of up to €600,000 for non-compliance.
For the Spanish government, companies like Airbnb are fueling a housing crisis that can only be stopped through regulation.
“Our obligation is to prioritise use of homes over tourist use,” Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said at a press conference last week. “There are too many Airbnbs. What’s lacking is housing.”
Sanchez claims that non-residents from outside the EU bought approximately 27,000 houses and apartments in Spain in 2023, not to live in but to make money from. “With the housing scarcity that we have, we clearly cannot allow this,” he concluded.
Alongside restrictions on who can rent out houses and new red tape for potential landlords, Spain is hoping to apply a tax of up to 100 per cent on property purchases for non-EU buyers. This would include buyers from the UK.
Another reason for the changes is residents speaking against the effects of overtourism. Throughout 2024, parts of Spain were rocked by dramatic anti-tourism protests at visitor hotspots, with more expected in 2025.
Despite local protests, Spain saw a 10 per cent increase in visitors in 2024, with 94 million foreign tourists visiting according to Tourism Minister Jordi Hereu.
For property owners, the implementation of these new rules is an unwelcome and often confusing addition.
“There is a lot of uncertainty about it,” says Samuel Toribio, head of Europe at rental platform Homelike. “We are seeing different layers of legislation being applied at the same time that in some cases are contradictory.”
Toribio notes that these different applications at municipal, regional and nationwide levels are causing confusion in the market. While the national policy requires a registration number, some regions are implementing the rules
Anne Frank's "The Diary of a Young Girl" remains one of the most famous and powerful works of the 20th century — and one of the most poignant accounts of a young person's life during the Holocaust.
Breeze Airways will ramp up its flying in a big way this spring and summer. The Utah-based low-cost carrier on Wednesday announced plans to launch service from three new airports by midyear.
Travel in Europe is getting more complicated to navigate for tourists. Some cities now charge a daily tourist tax that you have to pay on arrival.
Delta Air Lines announced it would launch a new nonstop service from Los Angeles (LAX) to Melbourne, Australia (MEL), beginning December 2025.
The U.S. Department of State has just announced an expanded series of special passport fairs scheduled to take place across the country, offering more opportunities for travelers who need to apply in person.
"New Orleans is a city of mood,” chef Serigne Mbaye tells me one Wednesday morning in September. We've been discussing the merits of Parkway's po'boys and the old-school kitchen at Commander's Palace. While growing up in Senegal and New York City, Mbaye cooked with his mother, and his Uptown restaurant, Dakar NOLA, braids his memories of this time with his haute restaurant experiences and the deep-rooted African heritage of New Orleans.
A United Airlines flight from Houston to New York was evacuated on Sunday morning because of flames coming from an engine, video shows.
The U.S. Department of State has released new dates through March for its special passport fairs around the country for travelers who must apply in person.
There’s magic in Vienna on New Year’s Eve. It’s not just the twinkling lights, the bustling holiday markets, or the excitement of a new 365 days to look forward to—it’s the music that spills out in the streets on the last day of the year. Vienna is known as the capital of classical music, and during New Year’s Eve, the streets are filled with the sounds of Silvesterpfad, one of the largest New Year's Eve celebrations in Europe. People dance in the streets holding glasses of champagne alongside their friends and partners. Just before midnight, soft snowflakes fell and kissed our faces—I didn't want the magic I was feeling to come to an end.
European low-cost behemoth and one of the biggest budget airlines in the world, Ryanair has pulled thousands of seats from its schedules for 2025 across several Spanish airports.
Working from home has become quite the privilege in the post-pandemic era. While some companies are rolling back working-from-home rules, others have enshrined them in their culture, actively encouraging workers to stay home and avoid the commute.
Jan 28, 2025 • 7 min read