Property Transfer Tax in Andalusia 2026: ITP, VAT and AJD Explained

The transfer tax you pay buying property in Andalusia in 2026 depends on one thing: whether the home is a resale or a new build. Resale carries a flat 7% ITP, set and collected by the Junta de Andalucia. New build from a developer carries 10% IVA (national VAT) plus 1.2% AJD stamp duty (regional), a combined 11.2% in headline tax. Add the notary, Land Registry and an independent lawyer, and the full acquisition stack lands between 10% and 13% of the price, with the exact figure depending on whether you buy resale or new build. This guide sets out the rates, the source behind every number, the worked cost table, and the four rules that decide which regime applies to your purchase.

How much is ITP in Andalusia in 2026?

Resale property in Andalusia carries a flat 7% ITP (Impuesto sobre Transmisiones Patrimoniales) on the declared purchase price, set and collected by the Agencia Tributaria de Andalucia. There are no progressive bands and no reduced first-home rate within the ITP itself. The 7% rate applies whether the property is a EUR 250,000 apartment in Fuengirola or a EUR 3,500,000 villa in Sierra Blanca. The tax is self-assessed by the buyer on the modelo 600 form, filed online with the Junta de Andalucia, and paid within 30 working days of signing the deed at the notary.

ITP is the buyer’s tax on a second-hand transfer between private owners. The seller does not pay it, the buyer does, and it is the larger single line on a typical Costa del Sol resale’s acquisition stack.

What about new build: ITP or VAT?

New-build property bought direct from a developer is not subject to ITP. Instead, the buyer pays 10% IVA (Impuesto sobre el Valor Anadido, the Spanish VAT) under the national Ley del IVA, plus AJD (Actos Juridicos Documentados) stamp duty at the regional rate set by the Junta de Andalucia. The two regimes are mutually exclusive on the same purchase. A new build from a developer pays 10% IVA plus AJD, and never pays ITP. A resale between private owners pays 7% ITP, and never pays IVA or AJD on the deed of sale.

The reason for the split is the legal nature of the seller. A developer selling a new-build unit for the first time is making a business supply subject to IVA. A private owner selling an existing home is not a business making a supply; the transfer is taxed under the regional ITP regime. Both regimes are settled at the notary, on the same day as the deed, but on different forms and to different administrations.

What is AJD stamp duty in Andalusia in 2026?

AJD (Actos Juridicos Documentados) is a stamp duty on notarised public documents (escrituras publicas). On a new-build purchase it is charged on the escritura publica de compraventa at the regional rate set by the Junta de Andalucia. The general rate in Andalusia is 1.2% of the documented price in 2026, applied to the same base as the IVA. Lower rates apply to protected housing (vivienda protegida) and to other deed types (novation, mortgage subrogation), but the standard new-build rate for a free-market property bought from a developer is 1.2%.

The rate history matters because the figure is sometimes quoted as 1.5% on stale pages. Andalusia reduced the general AJD rate from 1.5% to 1.2% in 2023, and held the 1.2% rate flat in 2024, 2025 and 2026. The reduced rate has been confirmed in the Agencia Tributaria de Andalucia’s current published tariff for 2026, accessible through the agency’s organismo page.

The worked cost table: ITP vs IVA + AJD at three Costa del Sol price points

The table below isolates the purchase tax on the transaction only, before notary, Land Registry and legal fees. It compares a resale and a new build at three price points typical of the western Costa del Sol in 2026.

Purchase price	Resale: 7% ITP	New build: 10% IVA + 1.2% AJD	Tax difference
EUR 500,000	EUR 35,000	EUR 56,000	EUR 21,000
EUR 1,000,000	EUR 70,000	EUR 112,000	EUR 42,000
EUR 2,000,000	EUR 140,000	EUR 224,000	EUR 84,000
EUR 5,000,000	EUR 350,000	EUR 560,000	EUR 210,000

The combined IVA + AJD on a new build is 4.2 percentage points higher than ITP on a resale, so the absolute gap widens linearly with the price. The choice between resale and new build on a Costa del Sol property is rarely driven by tax alone, but the tax gap is a real number in the budget and is the reason a new build needs a higher cash buffer at completion.

What are the total acquisition costs in 2026?

Purchase tax is the largest line, not the only one. The planning rule of thumb used by Spanish lawyers, gestors and tax advisors is to budget 10% to 13% of the price for the complete set of acquisition costs, before any mortgage arrangement fees and before annual ownership costs such as IBI (local property tax), community fees, home insurance and, for non-residents, the annual Modelo 210 filing.

Item	Resale (EUR 1,000,000 example)	New build (EUR 1,000,000 example)
Purchase tax	EUR 70,000 (7% ITP)	EUR 100,000 (10% IVA) + EUR 12,000 (1.2% AJD) = EUR 112,000
Notary (est.)	EUR 1,200-1,800	EUR 1,400-2,000
Land Registry (est.)	EUR 600-1,000	EUR 600-1,000
Independent lawyer (est., ~1% + VAT)	EUR 12,100	EUR 12,100
AJD on the mortgage (est., 1.2% of loan amount, if financed)	EUR 1,200-3,600 (on a EUR 100K-300K mortgage)	EUR 1,200-3,600
Total acquisition cost	~EUR 85,000-91,000 (~8.5-9.1%)	~EUR 127,000-129,000 (~12.7-12.9%)

The resale sits toward the lower end of the 10-13% range, the new build toward the upper end. Both stacks include the independent lawyer, which is standard practice on a Spanish purchase and the main safeguard against title, planning and tax issues. The lawyer’s fee typically runs around 1% of the price plus IVA, with a minimum that scales down for the smallest purchases.

Which regime applies: the four-rule decision table

A few rules of thumb decide which regime applies. None of them is a matter of buyer choice: the regime is set by the legal nature of the operation, not by what is cheapest.

Situation	Regime	Tax (Andalusia, 2026)
Buying a resale (second-hand home) from a private owner	ITP	7% on the declared price
Buying a new build direct from a developer (first transmission)	IVA + AJD	10% + 1.2% = 11.2% on the declared price
Buying an off-plan unit from a developer under a private contract (contrato privado) that is later elevated to a public deed	IVA + AJD	10% + 1.2%, paid on each stage payment as the deed of sale is signed; the reservation and stage payments follow the Ley 57/1968 regime on a separate guarantee track
Buying a protected housing unit (vivienda protegida) from a developer	IVA (super-reduced) + AJD (reduced)	4% IVA + reduced AJD scale (typically 0.3% to 0.5% in Andalusia for protected housing)

The off-plan case is worth a separate look. Off-plan buyers sign a private reservation contract (contrato de reserva), pay a stage-payment schedule into a special account protected by a bank guarantee, and only pay the IVA + AJD on the public deed of sale (escritura publica) when the developer delivers the finished unit. The stage payments are protected by Ley 57/1968, not by the ITP/IVA regime itself. The headline tax is still 10% + 1.2%, but the cash-flow profile is different from a resale. The off-plan protection regime, the bank guarantee types, and the 2022-2024 developer insolvency pattern sit in the off-plan buying mechanics pillar (cluster sibling, ships in a later write cycle of this queue).

What about non-resident and non-EU buyers?

The ITP rate on a resale is the same 7% regardless of the buyer’s nationality, residence status or visa type. The 10% IVA + 1.2% AJD on a new build is the same for everyone. Spain does not have a national transfer-tax surcharge for non-EU buyers that is in force in 2026. The frequently-quoted 100% recargo is a stalled proposicion de ley in the Congress of Deputies: it was registered in the legislative pipeline but has not been voted in plenary, has not passed the Senate, has not received Royal Assent, and has not been published in the BOE. The text of the proposal itself, even on the day it is hypothetically approved, would exempt off-plan and new-build sales by developers. The current cost stack on a Costa del Sol purchase is the 10-13% set out above, for any buyer, in 2026. The full myth-buster, the bill text and the off-plan carve-out sit in our 100% surcharge explainer (cluster sibling).

A non-resident owner selling a Costa del Sol property in 2026 pays a different stack on exit: a flat 19% IRNR capital gains tax, a 3% buyer retention paid at the notary, plus plusvalia municipal. The sale-side stack sits in the non-resident CGT pillar (cluster sibling, ships in a later write cycle of this queue).

How is ITP paid and what happens if the declared price is low?

ITP is self-assessed by the buyer on the modelo 600 form, filed online with the Junta de Andalucia and paid within 30 working days of signing the deed. The Agencia Tributaria de Andalucia publishes reference values (valor de referencia) by cadastral reference; the declared price on the deed is compared against the reference and against comparables in the area. If the Agencia Tributaria considers the declared price below market, it can issue a liquidacion complementaria plus late-payment interest and penalties.

The practical safeguard is to ask the seller’s agent, or your independent lawyer, to check the valor de referencia for the cadastral reference of the property before signing. A declared price close to or above the reference is rarely challenged. A declared price materially below the reference is a tax risk the buyer inherits on the day of completion. The risk is also a negotiation lever: a seller who insists on a low declared price to reduce ITP is asking the buyer to carry a tax risk on top of the price.

How the tax fits into the wider Costa del Sol buying picture

ITP, IVA and AJD are the tax line on the acquisition stack. The full stack (tax, notary, Land Registry, lawyer, AJD on the mortgage where it applies) is the 10-13% planning rule. Annual ownership costs (IBI, community fees, insurance, non-resident Modelo 210) sit on top. Sale costs (19% IRNR, 3% retention, plusvalia municipal) sit on exit. Mortgage arrangement costs (arrangement fee, appraisal, AJD on the mortgage deed, bank guarantee for off-plan) sit on financing. The ITP/IVA/AJD pillar is the entry-tax line that the cost-of-buying cluster pillar will integrate into a single 10-13% breakdown table once it ships. For an off-purchase view, the common mistakes playbook (cluster sibling) flags the resale-vs-new-build tax regime as a routine error in non-specialist advisory.

This guide is general information, not legal or tax advice. Rules change and individual circumstances differ. Verify current requirements with an independent lawyer (abogado) or tax advisor (gestor/asesor fiscal) before acting.