Foreign investment declaration when buying property in Spain

A foreign investment declaration is a notification to the Registro de Inversiones (kept by the Dirección General de Comercio Internacional e Inversiones) that a non-resident must file after buying property in Spain when the price exceeds 500 000 € (art. 4.h Real Decreto 571/2023). The deadline is one month from the date of the transaction, on form D-2A (art. 14 Orden ECM/57/2024). The purpose is statistical and administrative: the purchase itself does not depend on it. If a Spanish notary witnessed the escritura (the public deed of sale), the notary normally files it.

When is a declaration required for a property purchase?

When the buyer is a non-resident and the price of the property is above 500 000 €. The test is residence, not citizenship: an investor is a non-resident within the meaning of Ley 19/2003, to which art. 3 of Real Decreto 571/2023 refers. The declaration is filed after the transaction, and the date runs from the signing of the escritura before the notary.

The last row no longer concerns property but art. 4.a and 4.c of Real Decreto 571/2023: a stake of 10% or more in the capital of a Spanish company, and that shareholder's contributions to its own funds, are also declared. For an SL with capital or own funds above 3 M€ and a non-resident stake of 10% or more, an annual D-4 report is added, due seven months after year-end (art. 5.4 of the Real Decreto and art. 16 of the Orden).

Who files the declaration, and how does it work at the notary?

Usually the notary. If a Spanish notary formalised the purchase, the notary files the D-2A through the Consejo General del Notariado, provided the buyer has supplied all the required data. If the buyer has not, the notary must expressly warn about the declaration (art. 5.3.b of the Real Decreto). If a consul abroad witnessed the deal, the non-resident files it personally (art. 5.3.b of the Real Decreto), and the same applies when there was no notary at all (art. 14.2 of the Orden).

That raises a question for preparing the deal: has the information for the notary been gathered by the signing date? If no notary was involved, a copy of the transaction document is attached to the declaration (art. 10.1 of the Orden).

What changes if the funds come from a "non-cooperative" jurisdiction?

The declaration is filed in advance. Under art. 5.5 of Real Decreto 571/2023, for a property purchase above 500 000 € with a direct or ultimate source in a jurisdiction on the Orden HFP/115/2023 list, the preliminary form DP-2 is filed before the transaction, and after it the ordinary declaration is filed, this time without a threshold. Until 28 June 2026 the list had 24 entries. Orden HAC/649/2026 of 21 June 2026 removed six (Barbados, Dominica, Gibraltar, the Samoa offshore business regime, Seychelles, Trinidad and Tobago), so 18 remain in force, and from 28 December 2026 the Russian regime for international holding companies is added (BOE-A-2026-13946).

The words "direct or ultimate source" mean that the ownership chain is examined too. How this relates to a foreign holding is covered in the article on a holding above a Spanish SL.

Is permission needed to buy?

No. Authorisation is required in sensitive sectors (defence, critical infrastructure, energy), while the purchase of property unrelated to critical infrastructure is expressly exempt from prior authorisation (art. 17.3 of Real Decreto 571/2023). A separate rule applies to non-EU states buying property for diplomatic missions (art. 20); it has nothing to do with a private investor.

What does this look like for two buyers?

A worked example, not a forecast and not a DNPI project. Buyer A, a non-resident, buys an apartment for 450 000 €: the threshold is not exceeded, so under art. 4.h there is no declaration. Buyer B, also a non-resident, signs the escritura for a villa at 1.8 M€ on 10 November: the D-2A deadline is 10 December, and the notary files it if B supplied the data. If B's money came from the Cayman Islands (item 11 on the list), the DP-2 would have to be filed before the deal.

Who is this not for?

This article does not cover taxes or the origin of funds, which are separate obligations. If the buyer is a resident of Spain, art. 4.h does not apply. If the buyer is a Spanish SL, it is itself a resident, and the question shifts to the shareholder's contributions to its capital and group loans above 1 M€ with a term of more than a year (art. 4.e); how to classify a specific structure is for the abogado (lawyer) to decide. The text does not show whether several properties are added together when testing the threshold, which is also a question for the lawyer. Non-compliance is subject to the penalty regime of Ley 19/2003 (art. 7 of the Orden); I did not check the amounts.

The purchase sequence for a foreign investor is laid out in the roadmap, and non-resident taxes on a separate page. On moving money to Spain: capital transfer, documents and deadlines.