Mortgage Ancillary Costs Spain

Who pays which additional costs on a Spanish mortgage loan?

Since Real Decreto-ley 17/2018 and Ley 5/2019, the bank bears the stamp duty on the mortgage deed, the notary for the loan deed, the registration in the Land Registry, and the Gestoría — a Spanish administrative office that handles the bureaucratic steps around tax registration and entry. You only pay the Tasación (the valuation report, with which the bank determines the loan-to-value), the copies of the deed that you order yourself, and any arrangement fee. If you read a different allocation in a forum or leaflet, it dates from before November 2018.

The largest individual item, the tax on the mortgage deed, has thus shifted from the customer to the bank. The calculator above therefore separates two columns: what the bank owes and what ends up on your bill.

What the calculator applies to: a property in the Balearics, a loan from a bank to a private individual for the acquisition or upkeep of housing — that is, the scope of Ley 5/2019. The tax rate stems from Balearic regional law and does not apply to other regions; a loan to a company or for commercial purposes does not fall under the same cost allocation.

How it's calculated

Three items follow a fixed tariff and can be determined precisely in advance: tax, notary, and Land Registry. All three depend not on the loan amount, but on the responsabilidad hipotecaria — the mortgage liability sum, i.e. the amount for which the property is liable in the Land Registry. Under Art. 30.1 of the tax law TRLITPAJD, it includes not only the principal but also secured interest, enforcement costs, and contractual penalties, and in practice lies significantly above the loan amount; if the deed contains no explicit amount, the principal plus three years' interest applies. The liability sum is therefore the figure you need to look for in the offer.

The stamp duty AJD

The AJD (Actos Jurídicos Documentados, the stamp duty on notarised legal transactions) arises because the mortgage is arranged and registered in an escritura — a notarial deed. In the Balearics, the general rate for notarial deeds applies, which is 1.5%.The reduced rates for first homes do not apply here: the legal text expressly excludes derechos reales de garantía

, i.e. security rights.

You may pay less on the purchase deed, but not on the mortgage deed.

Since 10 November 2018, the debtor has been the bank. The legislator at that time added a sentence to Art. 29 TRLITPAJD: for deeds concerning loans secured by a mortgage, the lender is deemed the taxpayer. The calculator shows the AJD but attributes it to the bank.Arancel: a fixed base fee for the lowest value bracket, and above that a degressive scale that only applies to the excess above each threshold. The pattern is the same as for a purchase; you can read up on it where it explains how the notary and land registry fees are charged for the property purchase itself.

For mortgage deeds, both fee schedules additionally provide for their own reductions, and further ones are added from two liberalisation laws of 1999 and 2000. Each of these is applied to the amount remaining after the previous reduction — the wording states this explicitly: the reduction applies to the amount that arises una vez deducida la rebaja inicial once the initial discount has been deducted. How this translates into the specific calculation is shown by the notary and land registry calculator; this calculator here deliberately shows notary and land registry without an amount, because the bank bears them anyway and the figure changes nothing for your calculation.

The bank bears the fee for the matriz, the original that remains with the notary, and the registration of the security in the Registro de la Propiedad — the Spanish land registry, where ownership and encumbrances are recorded. The certified copy (copia autorizada), which is needed for the registration, also belongs on their side: whoever orders copies pays for them, and here it is the bank that ordered them. You yourself are entitled to a free simple copy; Ley 5/2019 expressly stipulates in its Disposición adicional octava that it is sent to you at no cost. You only have to pay for additional certified copies that you request yourself.

The items without a fee schedule

Three costs follow no fee schedule. The Tasación is carried out by an approved valuation company; the Orden ECO/805/2003 regulates in detail how the valuation is carried out, but says not a word about what it may cost. Equally unregulated is the fee of the Gestoría, which the bank bears anyway. And the comisión de apertura, the opening fee for review, processing and granting of the loan, is subject to only one rule under Ley 5/2019: it may only be charged once and must cover all of these costs — the law does not name a monetary cap. What your bank charges is stated in the binding offer, the FEIN (Ficha Europea de Información Normalizada, the European Standardised Information Sheet for the loan).

Worked examples

Three scenarios show what matters. Enter them above; the amounts depend on your liability amount.

The standard case. A flat in Mallorca, financed by a Spanish bank, with the liability amount equal to the loan amount. The bank's column includes AJD, notary, land registry and Gestoría fees and is by far the larger one; yours includes the Tasación, copies and, if agreed, the opening fee.

Liability amount above the principal. The more realistic case: enter the actual liability amount from the deed in the second field. All three of the bank's fee items increase, while your column remains unchanged. This explains why the liability amount tells you more than the nominal amount when comparing offers.

Early repayment.Enter the interest-rate fixation period, the date of the contract, the date of the planned early repayment, and its amount. The calculator states the upper limit for exactly this case — it says "at most", not "exactly this much". Two dates are needed because the law ties itself to two different points in time: which percentage was even allowed to be agreed is decided at the conclusion of the contract, whereas whether a claim arises at all is decided on the day of repayment.

Special cases

Change of bank and contract amendment

If you change banks during the term, this happens via a subrogación — the change of creditor, in which the new bank steps into the existing mortgage instead of a new one being set up; under Art. 7 of the Ley 2/1994, the deed for this is exempt from stamp duty. If your existing bank changes the terms, that is a novación modificativa — a contract amendment without a change of creditor. This too is exempt, but only narrowly: the change may relate exclusively to the interest rate, the term, or both, and the creditor must be a credit institution within the meaning of Art. 1 of the Ley 2/1994. If the principal is increased or the liability amount is changed, the exemption does not apply.

Very favourable special rules apply here for the notary and the land registry: the notary charges as for a deed without a stated value, and the land registry bases its fee only on a small fraction of the outstanding capital. In terms of fees, a change of bank is thus a different process from an initial financing.

What the old bank gets reimbursed

The last paragraph of Art. 14.1.e) of the Ley 5/2019 regulates a little-known point: in a subrogación under the Ley 2/1994, the taking-over bank must reimburse the replaced bank the proportional amount of the tax and costs the latter bore when the mortgage was set up. This is a settlement between the institutions, not your payment — but it explains why banks are more cautious about taking over other lenders' mortgages.

Cancellation of the mortgage

Once the loan has been repaid, the mortgage remains on the land registry until it is expressly cancelled. The deed for this is exempt from stamp duty; Art. 45.I.B).18 TRLITPAJD explicitly names it. What remains is a small notary fee under the tariff for deeds without a stated value, the land registry fee on a strongly reduced basis, and, where applicable, the fee of the gestoría — borne by the owner, since the Ley 5/2019 allocates the costs of setting up the mortgage, not those of ending it. Plan for this: without cancellation, the property is formally encumbered when sold.

Subsidised housing

Anyone who buys a flat under public price controls — in Spain a vivienda de protección oficial (VPO) — may under certain circumstances pay no stamp duty at all: Art. 45.I.B).12 TRLITPAJD exempts the setting-up of mortgage loans used exclusively for the purchase of such flats, subject to the conditions stated there. The calculator does not cover this case; it calculates the ordinary financing of a freely financed residential property. If your flat is price-controlled, have the exemption checked before signing the deed.

Two special Balearic rates

Two cases are not subject to the general rate: security rights in favour of a sociedad de garantía recíproca — a Balearic guarantee society that primarily provides sureties to small businesses — and the unilateral mortgage (hipoteca unilateral) in favour of the administration, for example to secure a tax deferral. Neither concerns a private property purchase and neither is reflected in the calculator.

The most common misconception

Time and again one reads that the bank takes on the tax „voluntarily" and that you should negotiate this. That is wrong: since 10 November 2018 it has been the statutory taxpayer — it doesn't pay the tax for you, but its own tax, and a clause that imposes the AJD on you does not transfer any tax liability. Equally non-negotiable is who bears the cost of notary, land registry and gestoría; Art. 14.1.e) allocates these costs conclusively. What can be negotiated is the interest rate, the arrangement fee, ancillary products and the price of the valuation.

The limits on early repayment compensation

Art. 23 of Ley 5/2019 caps the compensation for early repayment in two ways: it may not exceed the bank's actual financial loss — the pérdida financiera, defined as the difference between the outstanding capital and the market value of the loan — nor a percentage of the capital repaid early that depends on the interest-rate fixation period.

With a variable rate, the contract may only agree on one of two regimes: either compensation during the first five years with a limit of 0.15% or compensation during the first three years with a limit of 0.25%. After that, no compensation is permitted at all. With a fixed rate, a limit of 2% applies during the first ten years and a limit of 1.5% for the remaining term. For those switching from variable to fixed via novación or subrogación, a limit of 0.05% applies during the first three years; after that the bank may not charge anything for this. If no capital is repaid as part of the novación, no fee is due in any case.

Two notes: these are upper limits, not fixed amounts — your contract may specify a lower figure or no compensation at all, so check the FEIN. And for variable-rate loans, the charge was temporarily suspended altogether: from the entry into force of Real Decreto-ley 19/2022 on 24 November 2022 until 31 December 2024, no compensation whatsoever could arise for these loans — the provision literally states that no compensation would devengar, meaning it would not accrue in the first place. Since 1 January 2025, the regular limits apply again. The calculator reflects this: it asks for the date of the early repayment and, for a date within this window, states an upper limit of zero.

Deadlines and forms

The most important deadline runs before you sign. Under Art. 14, the bank must hand you the FEIN and the other pre-contractual documents at least ten days before the notarisation. During this time, under Art. 15 you are entitled to a free advisory meeting with the notary of your own choosing. He explains the contract terms to you and subsequently notarises a acta previa — a pre-deed certifying that you received and understood the documentation in good time. Without it, the mortgage deed cannot be notarised. Don't treat this meeting as a mere formality: it's the only moment when someone with no sales interest of their own explains the contract to you.

Next come the notarisation of the escritura de préstamo hipotecario, the filing and payment of the AJD, and the registration in the Registro de la Propiedad. You don't file the tax yourself — the bank does, usually through the gestoría it has appointed, which then also arranges the registration. At the end you receive a statement that you can check against the calculator: if an item appears in your column that, under Art. 14.1.e), is actually owed by the bank, that's a claim for reimbursement, not a point for negotiation. How the financing fits into the overall process is explained in the guide on how a property purchase in Spain works step by step, legally speaking. If you're still at the very beginning, you'll find the basics explained where it covers how property financing on Mallorca is structured and what Spanish banks require from buyers without residence in Spain.

Legal basis and status

All statements on this page and all values in the calculator are taken from the consolidated versions of these regulations, retrieved in September 2026 from boe.es.

• Ley 5/2019, Art. 14, 15 and 23 (cost allocation, advisory meeting, early repayment), in force since 16 June 2019 — boe.es
• Real Decreto-ley 17/2018 (bank's tax liability), applicable from 10 November 2018 — boe.es
• Real Decreto Legislativo 1/1993 (TRLITPAJD), Art. 29, Art. 30 and Art. 45.I.B) — boe.es
• Decreto Legislativo 1/2014 (Balearic Islands), Art. 15 and 17, plus Art. 16 and 18 for the special rates — boe.es
• Ley 2/1994, Art. 7, 8 and 9 (bank switching and contract amendments) — boe.es
• Real Decreto 1426/1989, Anexo I (notaries' fee schedule) — boe.es
• Real Decreto 1427/1989, Anexo I (land registrars' fee schedule) — boe.es
• Orden ECO/805/2003 (Tasación valuation procedure) — boe.es

Every figure in the calculator can be expanded and traced back to one of these sources. Inputs without an underlying regulation — Tasación, arrangement fee, number of pages — are marked as an assumption and start at zero. This guide does not replace individual professional advice.

Related calculators

The mortgage is just one of the cost blocks. What the purchase itself triggers in fees is calculated on the page about what notary and land registry costs for the purchase deed. You'll find the complete picture of tax, notary, land registry and advisory costs where all the ancillary costs of a property purchase in Mallorca can be brought together in a single calculation.