Ongoing Costs Mallorca

A dozen small items, spread across the year. The calculator adds them up to an annual total, a monthly value and a tax share.

What does a holiday property on Mallorca cost per year?

Charges come from all sides: the property tax from the town hall, the rubbish fee partly from the town hall and partly from the water supplier, the community fees from the owners' association, plus insurance, electricity, water and a tax return that many owners only think about once it's already due. Still, there's no blanket answer to the question of the total, and anyone who gives you one figure is guessing. The amount depends on four things that vary widely from property to property: the cadastral value (it determines the property tax and the self-use tax), the municipality (each sets its own tax rate and its own rubbish fee), the owners' association, and whether a pool and a garden need maintaining. Enter your own figures above — the calculator will then show you the total, the monthly average, and the share that taxes and charges make up of it.

How the calculation works

The calculator covers a self-used or vacant holiday property. Sixteen of the seventeen entries are amounts you already know or can read off your bills; exactly one item is calculated by the tool itself, namely the tax on self-use.

Taxes and charges

• IBI (property tax, Impuesto sobre Bienes Inmuebles) — the annual property tax levied by the municipality. It is based on the valor catastral (cadastral value), which is set by the Catastro (Spanish land registry office) and which regularly lies well below market value. The statutory range for residential properties within the town area runs from 0.4% to 1.1%; where exactly your municipality falls within it is set out in its Ordenanza fiscal. Enter the amount shown on your bill — the calculator does not derive it from the cadastral value, because the rate applies to the reduced assessment base and any reductions may already be factored in.
• Basura (rubbish fee) — in Palma this is actually two items that are often confused: the waste treatment fee is levied by the town hall, while the collection share is billed by EMAYA (Palma's municipal water and waste management company) via the water bill. If you've already included this share in the water bill, don't enter it here a second time.
• Cost of the tax return — what you pay your Gestoría (Spanish administrative and tax office) or your tax advisor for the annual return. A freely negotiated fee, so there's no default value.
• Modelo 210 (self-use) — the only item the calculator works out itself. Non-resident owners are taxed on a notional income for every day the property is not rented out: 1.1% of the cadastral value, if it was reassessed within the relevant period, otherwise 2%. This is where the tax rate for non-residents applies: 19% for residency in the EU or the EEA, 24% for residency in a third country. It's calculated using the same function as in the calculator for the deemed-use tax.

Running costs

• Comunidad de propietarios (community of owners) — the monthly community fee. There's no official figure for this: the community decides its own budget, and your share is based on the cuota de participación set out in the purchase deed. Between a small development with no staff and a complex with a pool, garden and lift, the factor can be as much as ten.
• Seguro de hogar (buildings and contents insurance) — the standard policy for owner-occupied flats and houses.
• Pool maintenance and garden maintenance — freely agreed services. If you don't have a pool, enter a 0 here; that's a value, not a gap.
• Electricity and water — for electricity, the fixed component made up of network charges, system levies and meter rental is independent of consumption and applies even to an empty property. The same goes for water: the standing charges and the fixed portion of the Canon de Saneamiento, the Balearic wastewater levy.
• Property management — key service, inspection visits, coordinating tradespeople.
• Other — a catch-all item for maintenance, reserves, a derrama (special levy raised by the community of owners for unscheduled works), internet and security systems. Make sure you don't double-count anything that's already included in the community fee.

What the calculator deliberately does not do

It doesn't make up any figures. For the property tax, the refuse charge, and the water and electricity tariffs, there are published rates, and the pre-filled values are derived from these — with the source given directly beneath the calculator. For the community fee, garden maintenance, property management and advisor's fees, there is no fixed pricing and no reliable statistics in Spain. These fields therefore start out blank rather than at zero: a zero would imply the item doesn't apply, and it would also push up the calculated share of taxes and levies. As long as one of these figures is missing, the total shown is explicitly a subtotal, and the percentage share is left out.

All amounts are gross expenses, including IVA and any levies included. This matters more than it sounds: quotes for pool or garden maintenance on Mallorca are usually given net, while your utility bills are gross. If you lump both together without checking, you'll end up underestimating by more than a fifth.

Worked examples

Below the calculator you'll find three fully completed example cases: a reference flat, a finca with a pool, and a case involving rented-out days. One click loads the values into the form, so you can immediately see the total, the monthly average and the breakdown, then switch field by field to match your own property. We deliberately don't quote the figures here in the text — in the calculator they change with the selected tax year, whereas in running text they would go out of date.

Above all, it is useful to compare the three cases with one another. It shows that the items you cannot influence — property tax (IBI), refuse collection charge, and the tax on personal use — usually make up the smaller share for a normal flat, and that the costs arise chiefly where technical systems and green areas need upkeep.

Special cases

You let the property to tourists

Then two things shift. First, no tax on personal use applies for days the property is let — enter the number of let days above, and the calculator deducts them. In its place, however, comes a separate declaration of the rental income, also via the Modelo 210, which this calculator does not compute. Anyone who deducts the days but forgets the income taxation will underestimate their tax burden.

Second, cost items are added that are missing here: the Ecotasa (the Balearic tourist tax, which the guest bears but which you must register and pay over), a commercial insurance policy with liability cover in place of the private home policy, cleaning and laundry at every change of guests, and, depending on the arrangement, commissions charged by booking platforms. The annual total from this calculator is therefore a lower bound for a let property, not the full picture.

You only own a share

In cases of co-ownership, each owner files a separate declaration for their share. Enter your share as a percentage and record all other amounts as your share too — otherwise the calculator will add up an entire property against a proportional tax.

Palma is not Mallorca

The IBI rate and the refuse collection charge are set individually by each municipality. The default figures in this calculator come from the ordinances of the city of Palma and are an example, not an island-wide value: Calvià, Andratx, Pollença, or Santanyí calculate with their own rates and their own fee schedules. Your IBI notice shows the amount that applies to you — and that takes precedence over any default figure.

No cadastral value has been set for your property

This occurs with new builds and after renovations, as long as the Catastro has not yet completed the valuation. In that case, a different basis of assessment applies for the tax on personal use, and this case is not calculated here. In such an instance, do not enter an estimated value and rather treat the item as open, instead of closing it with a zero.

What is not included in the total anyway

Not included are financing costs, i.e. interest and repayment on a mortgage loan, as well as Spanish wealth tax. Wealth tax does not depend on this property alone, but on your entire wealth liable to tax in Spain — there is a separate calculator for that, linked at the end of this page.

Deadlines and forms

These items follow very different rhythms, and there is only one of them that you need to trigger yourself:

• IBI — annual, with a voluntary payment period set by the municipality. A direct debit mandate is the simplest way; without direct debit, a missed deadline leads to a reminder procedure with a surcharge.
• Basura — the treatment portion is levied by the municipality, the collection portion appears in Palma on the EMAYA invoice.
• Modelo 210 for owner-occupation — the tax arises on 31 December of the tax year and is declared the following year. This is the only item in this calculator that you need to take care of yourself; everything else about filing windows and payment methods is covered in the Guide to the owner-occupation tax.
• Comunidad, insurance, electricity, water — ongoing contracts, usually by direct debit. A special levy from the comunidad comes on top and outside the regular schedule.

A practical tip: a Spanish account with direct debit mandates for property tax, water, electricity and community fees saves you most reminders. A bounced direct debit with the comunidad becomes unpleasant faster than a late tax payment, because it can affect your access to the community's decisions and votes.

Legal basis and status

The owner-occupation tax follows the Spanish Non-Resident Income Tax Law (Real Decreto Legislativo 5/2004): the notional income from the cadastral value, its reduction for rented days, and the tax rate according to the country of residence. The legal framework for the IBI rate is set out in the Law on Local Finances (Real Decreto Legislativo 2/2004); the specific rate and the rubbish fee are decided by each municipality in its annual ordenanza fiscal.

Below the calculator you'll find a line Legal status with a date. It doesn't mean "last checked", but something more precise: it's the date of the most recent regulation factored into this calculation, relative to the reference date of the selected tax year. If the relevant tax rates and assessment rules have remained unchanged since 2023, it shows 2023 — even if the rubbish fee comes from a 2026 ordinance. Both are correct at the same time: the tax regulations are older than the fee tariffs. If one of the regulations changes, the date moves with it, and if you select a different tax year, the calculator uses the law that applied on that year's reference date, not today's.

For the non-tax defaults — property tax amount, rubbish fee, water, electricity, insurance — the sources with retrieval date are also listed below the calculator. Two of these are older than one might expect: the water and collection tariffs in Palma are the most recently published applicable tariffs, but their latest version dates back several years. If in doubt, check your own invoice; it's always a better source than any default.

Frequently asked questions

Related calculators

• Owner-occupation tax Modelo 210 — one tax position of this calculator in detail: tax base, tax rate according to residence, filing window and late-payment surcharges.
• Wealth Tax Balearics — the annual tax on the wealth itself, with the Balearic allowance and the solidarity tax. It doesn't belong in the running costs, but in the same annual planning.