Barcelona, Paris, and Amsterdam have all dramatically tightened control over tourist apartments — landlord fines can reach six-figure sums, and that can translate directly into your right to a refund.
Spain: Mandatory Registration Number on Every Listing Since July 2025
Since July 1, 2025, Spain has required every short-term rental advertised on any platform to display a national registration number (NRA), under Royal Decree 1312/2024. Platforms are required to remove any listing missing that number within 48 hours. Barcelona represents the strictest case in the country: the city council will not renew any of its 10,101 existing tourist apartment licenses when they expire in November 2028 — a decision upheld by Spain's Constitutional Court in March 2025 — with the stated goal of returning those units to the residential housing market. Operators renting without a license face penalties that, in the most serious confirmed Barcelona cases, have reached as high as €600,000. Separately from fines against individual operators, Spain's own consumer affairs ministry fined Airbnb €64 million over advertisements that failed to comply with applicable regulations.
France: Night Caps and National Registration
Law No. 2024-1039 requires every tourist rental to be registered through a national online portal, and requires proof of primary-residence status to qualify for certain allowances. From 2025, French municipalities can reduce the annual rental cap from 120 to 90 nights, and fines for non-compliance can reach €15,000 per violation, with higher figures for more serious infractions depending on the specific type of violation. Paris is additionally building a national registry cross-referenced against other municipal databases specifically to detect undeclared listings.
Netherlands (Amsterdam): Night Caps, Not Just Registration
Amsterdam caps tourist rental of a primary residence at 30 nights per year, with proposals to reduce that cap to 15 nights in certain zones starting April 2026, subject to council approval. The city combines mandatory digital registration with in-person inspections to catch undeclared rentals.
The Piece That Genuinely Is EU-Level: Regulation 2024/1028
Unlike the specific registration rules and penalty amounts — which are set by each country or even each city individually — there is one genuinely EU-level instrument in this space: Regulation (EU) 2024/1028, which harmonizes data collection and sharing on short-term rental services between platforms and public authorities across all 27 member states, taking effect May 20, 2026. This doesn't create a single EU-wide night cap or penalty — cities and countries still decide that on their own — but it does require platforms to share data in a standardized way with authorities in any member state, which meaningfully improves detection of undeclared listings across borders.
What Refund Rights a Guest Has If a Booking Turns Out to Be Unregistered
If you book accommodation that turns out to be an unregistered or illegal short-term rental, and the booking is cancelled or the stay can't go ahead because of that, you generally retain the right to a full refund from the platform or host — the fact that the host operated illegally doesn't shift that financial risk onto the guest. If the platform resists issuing a refund, the escalation path runs through the platform itself first, then the relevant national consumer authority if there's no satisfactory response.
What This Means Practically
- Before booking a vacation rental in a major European city, check whether the listing displays a visible registration number — its absence is a genuine warning sign, not just a bureaucratic detail.
- If your booking is cancelled because of the host's regulatory noncompliance, you're generally entitled to a refund — don't assume you simply lose the money.
- Penalty amounts and night caps change frequently and vary significantly by city — confirm the current rules for your specific destination rather than assuming another country's figures apply.
Related Kibbo Tools
Sources
- AirROI — EU Short-Term Rental Regulations 2026. airroi.com
- AirROI — Spain's €64M Airbnb Fine. airroi.com