Buying Property in Valencia 2026: A Foreign Buyer's Guide

Buying a home in Valencia is not complicated, but it is unfamiliar, and almost every expensive mistake a foreign buyer makes here comes from assuming it works the way it does at home. It does not. The estate agent is not neutral. The deposit you pay can be lost or doubled depending on one word in the contract. The notary is not your lawyer. And the asking price is not the money you need.

This guide walks the whole thing in the order you will actually meet it, from the number you need before you can do anything to the tax bill that lands every year afterwards. It is written for the person doing this from abroad, or a year into living here, in English, without a Spanish family member to explain it.

Can a Foreigner Buy Property in Spain?

Renting first, or not sure yet? We have a companion guide to renting in Valencia: the fianza, the nómina problem, and what a Spanish lease actually commits you to.

Yes. Spain places no nationality restriction on buying residential property. You do not need to be an EU citizen, you do not need to live in Spain, and you do not need a visa or a residence permit. Non-residents buy Spanish homes every day, and the process is the same one Spaniards go through, with a couple of extra forms.

The important thing to understand is the reverse: owning a home in Spain does not give you the right to live in Spain. Ownership and immigration are separate systems. If you are not an EU citizen, buying a flat in Ruzafa does not extend the 90 days in any 180 that the Schengen rules give you as a visitor. If you want to live here, you need a visa in its own right, which is a different piece of work and covered in our moving to Valencia guide.

That used to be less true. Spain's investor "golden visa", which granted residency for a property purchase of 500,000 EUR or more, was repealed by Ley Orgánica 1/2025 of 2 January 2025 and stopped being granted on 3 April 2025. Applications filed complete before that date were processed under the old rules, and permits already issued keep their renewal rights, but the route is closed to new buyers. Any agency still marketing a Spanish property as a path to residency is selling you something that no longer exists.

What You Need Before You Start

Three things slow foreign buyers down more than anything else, and all three can be started before you have even seen a property.

1. An NIE

The NIE (Número de Identidad de Extranjero) is your Spanish foreigner identification number. You cannot complete a purchase without one: it goes on the deed, on the tax return and on the registry entry. Every buyer named on the deed needs their own, so a couple buying together needs two.

You can apply in Spain at a police station or foreigners' office, or at a Spanish consulate in your own country before you travel, which is usually the calmer route. The application is form EX-15 plus the administrative fee paid on the Modelo 790 código 012, which is around 10 EUR. The fee is trivial; the appointment is the hard part. A gestor or your lawyer can do it for you under a power of attorney. The full process is in our NIE in Valencia guide.

One piece of useful slack: the NIE is strictly required at the deed, not before it. If your number is still in process you can normally sign the private deposit contract on your passport, so a slow appointment does not have to cost you the property. Do not rely on that without asking your lawyer first.

2. A Spanish bank account

Not strictly a legal requirement to own property, but in practice you want one. The notary will normally want to see the funds arriving through traceable Spanish banking, the purchase is often settled with a bank cheque drawn on a Spanish account, and afterwards you will need a Spanish account anyway for the direct debits on the council tax, the community fees and the utilities. Non-residents can open a non-resident account with a passport and, usually, a certificate of non-residence.

3. Your money, in euros, in Spain, on time

This is the part that ruins completion dates. Large international transfers take longer than people expect, banks ask compliance questions about the source of funds, and the exchange rate on a 300,000 EUR transfer moves by thousands of euros while you are deciding. Start the conversation with your bank or a currency broker early, and be ready to document where the money came from. Spanish anti-money-laundering rules mean your lawyer and your bank will both ask.

How to Search, and Who the Agent Actually Works For

Most listings in Valencia live on Idealista and Fotocasa, with agency websites and the occasional se vende sign on a balcony filling the gaps. The same property is often listed by several agencies at slightly different prices, which is normal and not a scam.

Here is the structural thing to hold on to: in Spain the estate agent is instructed and paid by the seller. Agency fees are not regulated, and in practice run around 3% to 5% of the sale price plus VAT, settled by the seller out of the proceeds at the deed. As the buyer you do not get a separate invoice for it, which is exactly why it is easy to forget that the friendly, English-speaking agent is not working for you. Nothing they say about the building, the debts, the licence or the boundaries is a substitute for your own checks. This is the single most common misunderstanding foreign buyers arrive with, and it is the reason the lawyer section below exists.

One check worth thirty seconds: the Comunitat Valenciana runs a compulsory public register of property intermediation agents, so before you hand anyone a reservation deposit you can look up whether the agency is actually on it.

Two practical notes on searching from abroad. First, listing photographs in Spain are often wide-angle and generous, so a video walkthrough is worth asking for before you fly. Second, the neighbourhood matters more than the flat here, because Valencia's barrios differ enormously in noise, transport and what they cost per square metre, and you cannot undo that choice later.

Where to Buy: The Barrio Decision

Valencia is small enough to walk across and varied enough that two flats of the same size, ten minutes apart, can differ by 40% in price and completely in atmosphere. The centre and the sea command the premium: L'Eixample and Ciutat Vella sit at the top of the per-square-metre table, Ruzafa just behind, El Cabanyal is the beach-side one that has been rising fastest. Head out to Patraix, Benimaclet or Benicalap and you buy noticeably more space for the money without leaving the city. Beyond the city limits, Bétera, Paterna and Godella are where the houses with gardens are, and where you will need a car.

Here is the full asking-price table for all nineteen areas. It is the same data the quiz below runs on, and it is stamped into this page from one source, so the two can never disagree. Asking prices from Fotocasa, August 2026.

Prices are what sellers are asking this month, not what properties finally sell for, and the gap between the two is a matter for your own negotiation. For what each of these areas is actually like to live in, and how they compare against one another, see where to live in Valencia.

If you already have a shortlist, the individual area pages go deeper on each one: Ruzafa, El Cabanyal, L'Eixample, Benimaclet, Patraix, Ciutat Vella, Bétera and Godella and Rocafort.

The Offer, the Reserva and the Arras

Spain has no chain and no gazumping culture in the British sense, because money changes hands early and it binds. There are usually two steps between "we like it" and the notary.

The reserva

A small holding payment, often a few thousand euros, paid to the agency to take the property off the market for a short window while your lawyer starts the checks. Read what it says about refunds before you pay it. A reserva that is non-refundable in all circumstances is a bad deal, because the checks have not happened yet.

The arras, which is the one that matters

The contrato de arras is the private deposit contract that fixes the price, the parties, the completion date and what happens if either side walks away. No law sets the amount. In practice it runs between 5% and 15% of the purchase price, with 10% by far the most common, and it is deducted from the price at completion. It is also real money at risk.

Spanish law recognises more than one kind of arras, and the difference is the whole ball game:

• Arras penitenciales (article 1454 of the Civil Code) are the usual choice in a resale purchase. They buy both sides the right to walk away at a known price: if the buyer pulls out, the buyer loses the deposit; if the seller pulls out, the seller returns it doubled. Neither party can force the sale.
• Arras confirmatorias simply confirm the contract. There is no agreed exit price, and the other side can sue to force completion or claim its actual losses.
• Arras penales set the deposit as an agreed penalty for breach, while still leaving the possibility of demanding performance.

Crucially, Spanish courts do not assume the penitential version. The Supreme Court has held that simply handing over a deposit does not make it penitential: the contract has to say so expressly, either by citing article 1454 or by spelling out the right to withdraw and the consequence for each side. Get that wrong and your "I can walk away and lose my deposit" assumption is wrong with it. Never sign an arras contract you have not had read by your own lawyer, and never sign one before the checks below are done.

Your Own Lawyer, and Why Not the Seller's

An independent lawyer (abogado) is not legally compulsory in a Spanish purchase. It is also the one line in the cost table we would never cut. Budget roughly 800 to 2,500 EUR for a straightforward residential purchase, or around 1% of the price for a more complex one.

Independent means something specific here: not the agency's in-house lawyer, not one recommended by the seller, not the developer's. In Spain, unlike in some countries, one professional can end up sitting between both sides, and the interests do not align when a problem is found. Ask directly who is paying them, and hire your own.

What they actually do for the money:

• Pull the nota simple from the Land Registry (Registro de la Propiedad). This is the extract that shows who legally owns the property, the registered description and size, and any charges on it: mortgages, embargoes, easements, court orders. Anyone can order one online from the registrars' own site for about 9 EUR plus VAT, and it is the foundation of everything else. Note its legal status: a nota simple is informative only and does not certify the register's contents. Where something turns on it, the document with legal force is a certificación registral. In Spain, debts registered against a property follow the property, not the person who ran them up. The notary orders a fresh one within hours of signing, to catch anything registered at the last minute.
• Check the debts that do not appear on the nota simple. Unpaid IBI (council tax), unpaid community of owners fees, and unpaid utility bills. The community of owners can issue a certificate of outstanding debt, and you should insist on seeing it. This is not a formality: under article 9.1.e of the Horizontal Property Law the flat itself answers for unpaid community charges from the year of the purchase and the three preceding calendar years, whoever ran them up. Older debts do not follow the property, but three years of arrears on a building with a lift is real money. The seller is obliged to produce that certificate and the notary cannot authorise the deed without it unless the buyer expressly waives it. Never waive it. A waiver is you volunteering to absorb whatever is owed.
• Check the paperwork of the building itself: the cadastral record and whether it matches the registry, and whether any extension, enclosed terrace or converted room was ever legalised. Two Valencian documents to know by their current names, because older guides use the wrong ones. The cédula de habitabilidad no longer exists here: since 2021 the equivalent is a declaración responsable de segunda ocupación, generally needed on a change of ownership or a new utility contract, and valid ten years. And the old ITE building inspection is now the IEEV.CV, compulsory for residential buildings over 50 years old and filed to the Generalitat, not the town hall. Ciutat Vella and El Cabanyal are full of buildings well past fifty.
• Check the community. The minutes of recent owners' meetings tell you whether a 40,000 EUR facade or lift refurbishment has been voted through, which the seller has no incentive to volunteer.
• Draft or review the arras, handle the tax filing afterwards, and attend the notary with you.

Mortgages for Non-Residents

Spanish banks lend to non-residents, and they lend on worse terms than they lend to residents. Plan around three differences.

• Loan to value. Residents can typically reach 80%. Non-residents are usually offered 60% to 70%, so you need to find 30% to 40% of the price yourself, before any tax or fees.
• Term. Shorter, often 20 to 25 years, and usually capped by your age at the end of the term.
• Valuation, not price. The percentage is applied to the lower of the purchase price and the bank's own valuation (tasación). If the valuation comes in under the price, the shortfall is yours.

The valuation is the one mortgage cost you pay: budget 250 to 400 EUR. Everything else on the mortgage deed is the lender's: the notary, the Land Registry inscription and the gestoría under Ley 5/2019 (the LCCI), and the AJD stamp duty under a 2018 reform that made the lender the taxpayer on mortgage deeds. Before those two changes it all fell on the borrower, and plenty of guides online still say so.

The same law adds a step to the calendar. The bank must put the binding offer and the standardised information sheet (the FEIN) in your hands, and a minimum reflection period of ten calendar days has to pass before the mortgage deed can be signed. Inside that window you attend a free appointment at the notary, alone, without the bank, where the notary goes through the documentation, checks you understand what you are signing and records it in an acta. The reflection period cannot be waived, and the acta and the deed cannot be signed on the same day. It is a consumer protection rather than an obstacle, but it means a mortgage purchase cannot be compressed at the end.

Banks will also push insurance and other products at you as a condition of a better rate. Some of that bundling is restricted by law and some of it is negotiable. Compare the total cost, not the headline rate, and consider an independent broker if you are applying from abroad.

The Full Cost Stack: What You Pay on Top of the Price

The asking price is not the money you need, and the gap is the most expensive surprise a foreign buyer meets in Spain. Here is the whole stack for the Comunitat Valenciana.

The tax, which is the big one

Which tax you pay depends entirely on whether the property is a resale or a new build.

• Resale home: ITP (Impuesto de Transmisiones Patrimoniales). In the Comunitat Valenciana the rate is 9% of the price up to 1,000,000 EUR, and 11% on anything above that. This has been the rate for deeds signed since 1 June 2026: it was cut from 10% by Ley 5/2025 of 30 May, which amended article 13 of Ley 13/1997. If a page quotes you 10%, it has not been updated.
• New build from a developer: IVA plus AJD. VAT (IVA) at 10% of the price, plus stamp duty (AJD) at the Valencian general rate of 1.4%, also cut from 1.5% on 1 June 2026. There is no ITP on a new build.

The fees

Notary and registry fees are regulated sliding scales, so they rise with the price rather than being flat. The rest are market rates, and we quote them as ranges because the spread is the honest part.

That last row is the one to internalise, and it is why we refuse to publish a single "budget 12%" figure. On a 100,000 EUR flat bought outright, the tax and fees land between 11% and 13.7% on top, and a mortgage nudges the top of that past 14%. On a 300,000 EUR flat they land between 9.7% and 10.8%. On a 750,000 EUR house, closer to 9.4% and 10.2%. The tax is proportional; the notary, registry, gestoría and lawyer are not, so the cheaper the property, the more they weigh.

What you do not normally pay: the estate agent's commission is the seller's, settled out of the proceeds. The plusvalía municipal, the council tax on the increase in land value since the seller bought, is also the seller's under article 106 of the local finance law.

ITP itself carries a similar idea: the property is answerable for the tax, so an unpaid ITP from an earlier sale can attach to the flat you just bought. This is what the afección fiscal notes on a nota simple are, and it is another reason to read one.

A Worked Example: a 300,000 EUR Resale Flat

Take a two-bedroom resale flat in a mid-range Valencia barrio at 300,000 EUR. Here is the money, in full, both ways.

Buying outright, no mortgage

That is 9.7% to 10.8% on top of the asking price.

With a non-resident mortgage at 70%

Borrowing does not shrink the bill, it changes its shape. The bank lends 210,000 EUR, you find the other 90,000 EUR, and the tax and fees are still yours, plus the valuation.

At the tighter end of non-resident lending, 60% instead of 70%, the same flat needs 149,250 to 152,650 EUR of your own money. That is the range to budget against if you are applying from abroad without a Spanish income.

The Notary Day, and What Happens After

Completion in Spain happens in one room, in one sitting, usually in under an hour. The buyer, the seller, the agent and normally both lawyers meet at the notary's office, and if there is a mortgage the bank's representative comes too.

The notary (notario) is a public official, not anyone's lawyer. Their job is to verify identities, read the deed, confirm both parties understand it, check the registry immediately before signing, and formalise the transfer. They will not negotiate for you and they will not tell you the price is too high. Article 126 of the Notarial Regulation gives you the right to choose your notary: where there is no agreement between the parties, the choice belongs to whoever pays the larger share of the fees, which in a normal purchase is the buyer. Worth knowing if the agent presents a notary as a given. Notarial tariffs are set nationally, so choosing a different notary does not change the bill, only who you deal with.

The document you sign is the escritura pública de compraventa. At that moment the keys change hands and the payment is made, typically by a bank cheque prepared in advance. The notary then sends an immediate electronic notice to the Land Registry, which protects your position while the paperwork catches up.

Afterwards, in this order: the ITP is filed and paid on the Modelo 600 within one month of the deed, the deed plus the paid tax form go to the Land Registry, and the registry inscribes you as owner. The registrar has fifteen working days to examine and inscribe it, but that clock does not start until the tax settlement is filed. So a few weeks to a couple of months from signing is the realistic expectation, longer if the registrar finds a defect to correct. Then the utilities and the IBI direct debits get switched into your name, which your gestoría or lawyer will usually do as part of the job.

As a realistic calendar: from accepted offer to keys, four to six weeks is typical for a cash purchase where the paperwork is clean and your NIE is already in hand, and eight to twelve weeks is more realistic with a mortgage, because the bank's valuation, the binding offer and the ten-day reflection period all sit inside it. Any inheritance, unregistered extension or missing licence in the chain adds months, not days.

What You Owe Every Year After You Own It

Buying is the one-off. These are the recurring bills, and non-residents have one more than residents do.

IBI, the council property tax

The IBI (Impuesto sobre Bienes Inmuebles) is levied by the town hall and calculated as a percentage of the valor catastral, the administrative value of the property, which is normally well below the market price. Rates are set by each municipality within legal bands (0.4% to 1.10% for urban property nationally). Valencia city's urban rate for 2026 is 0.5784% of the rateable base, cut from the previous 0.723%. Because the valor catastral is usually far below what you paid, the receipt on an ordinary Valencia flat runs to a few hundred euros a year rather than thousands, though a prime central address can be several times a modest barrio's.

The person liable is whoever owns the property on 1 January, for the whole year. Spanish case law lets the seller pass on a time-proportional share unless the contract says otherwise, so expect a clause about it in the deed, and check which way it points.

The new waste tax, which is not small any more

Spain's 2022 waste law (Ley 7/2022) obliges every municipality to charge a specific, non-deficit waste fee that recovers the real cost of collecting and treating rubbish, so councils that used to bundle it into the IBI now bill it separately, and it went up. Valencia city's version applies from 2025 and the first receipts went out during 2026, which is why residents were surprised by a bill they had never seen before.

The domestic fee is banded on the previous year's metered water consumption, from roughly 39 EUR a year at the lowest band to roughly 273 EUR at the top, with most dwellings at the bottom of that range. A separate metropolitan waste charge can also apply. We are not going to publish a single headline figure here, because the sources we checked did not agree on how the municipal fee and the metropolitan one combine. Take the number from the current municipal ordinance or your own receipt, not from a guide.

Community of owners fees

If you buy a flat, you join the comunidad de propietarios and pay a monthly share of the building's costs: cleaning, lift, insurance, and any building fund. A building with a lift, a concierge, a pool or a garden costs materially more than a plain block. Ask for the current figure and the last two years of minutes before you commit, because an approved special levy for a facade or a lift is a real liability attached to your flat.

Modelo 210, the non-resident tax that surprises people

If you are not a Spanish tax resident and you own a home here, Spain taxes you on it even if you never rent it out and never let anyone use it. This is the imputación de rentas inmobiliarias, a notional income assigned to a property at your own disposal, declared on Modelo 210.

The base is 2% of the cadastral value, or 1.1% where that value has been revised under a general collective valuation in the last ten tax years. The rate applied to the base is 19% if you are tax resident in the EU, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein, and 24% for everyone else, which is the line that quietly makes a British or American owner more expensive than a Dutch one. Nothing is deductible against imputed income. If you do rent the property out, the rental income goes on the same form instead, and EU and EEA residents can deduct expenses that non-EU residents cannot.

The sums are usually modest. The problem is that people do not know the obligation exists, and it accrues quietly until someone sells and the tax office looks back.

Owners should also be aware of Spain's wealth tax (Impuesto sobre el Patrimonio), which applies to non-residents on their Spanish assets above a threshold, with regional variation. For most buyers of a single flat it is not in play, but for a large purchase it is a question for your adviser before you sign, not after.

The Traps Foreign Buyers Hit

• Budgeting only the price. If you have 300,000 EUR, you are shopping at about 270,000 EUR, not 300,000 EUR. The tax and fees are not optional and they are not small.
• Using the seller's or the agency's lawyer. Free is not free when the person checking the property is paid by the person selling it.
• Signing the arras before the checks. Once the deposit is with the seller, your leverage is gone and your options are the ones written in the contract.
• Assuming the deposit is refundable. If the contract does not clearly say arras penitenciales, walking away may cost you far more than the deposit.
• Not asking about the community. Approved building works, arrears and an underfunded reserve are all discoverable from the minutes and the community certificate, and all of them land on you.
• Registered size versus real size. The registry description, the cadastral record and the listing can all disagree. Enclosed terraces and converted lofts are the usual culprits, and an unlegalised one is your problem the moment you own it.
• Forgetting the ITP deadline, or reading the wrong one. In the Comunitat Valenciana it is one month from the deed, not the 30 working days most websites repeat. Miss it and you get surcharges, and the deed does not get registered.
• Buying from a non-resident seller without retaining anything. Two liabilities move to you: the plusvalía municipal, and a 3% withholding on the price that you must pay over to the tax office. Both are handled by retaining the money at completion, and both are painful if nobody thought about them.
• Ignoring Modelo 210. Non-resident owners owe an annual return whether or not the property earns anything.
• Believing property buys residency. It does not. Spain scrapped its investor visa route, and in any case ownership and immigration status were always separate.
• Buying the flat before the neighbourhood. You can renovate a kitchen. You cannot move the building away from the nightlife, the tram line or the school run.

Buying Property in Valencia: FAQ

Can a foreigner buy property in Spain without residency?

Yes. There is no nationality or residency restriction on buying residential property in Spain. You need an NIE, and in practice a Spanish bank account, but you do not need to live here or hold a visa. Owning property does not, by itself, give you any right to live in Spain.

How much does buying property in Spain cost on top of the price?

In the Comunitat Valenciana, budget roughly 9% to 14% on top of the asking price for a resale home: 9% ITP transfer tax plus notary, land registry, gestoría and lawyer. The percentage is higher on cheaper properties because the fixed fees weigh more. On a 300,000 EUR flat the total lands around 329,000 to 332,250 EUR.

What is the property transfer tax in Valencia in 2026?

ITP on a resale home in the Comunitat Valenciana is 9% up to 1,000,000 EUR and 11% on the excess, for deeds signed from 1 June 2026, after Ley 5/2025 cut it from 10%. A new build is not subject to ITP at all: it carries 10% IVA plus 1.4% AJD stamp duty.

Do I need a Spanish bank account to buy a property?

It is not a legal requirement, but it is the practical answer. Payment at the notary is normally made by a bank cheque drawn on a Spanish account, and afterwards you need one for the IBI, the community fees and the utility direct debits. Non-residents can open a non-resident account with a passport.

How much can a non-resident borrow in Spain?

Typically 60% to 70% of the lower of the purchase price and the bank's own valuation, against about 80% for residents, and usually over a shorter term. Plan on finding 30% to 40% of the price yourself, plus the tax and fees on top. Since Spain's 2019 mortgage law the bank pays the stamp duty, notary, registry and gestoría on the mortgage deed itself; you pay the valuation, around 250 to 400 EUR.

Can I still get a golden visa by buying property in Spain?

No. Ley Orgánica 1/2025 of 2 January 2025 repealed the investor visa, and Spain stopped granting residency for property purchases on 3 April 2025. Applications filed complete before that date were still processed, and existing permits keep their renewal rights, but buying a home is no longer a route to Spanish residency. If you want to live here you need a visa in its own right, such as the Digital Nomad Visa or the Non-Lucrative Visa.

Is there a 100% tax on non-EU buyers of Spanish property?

Not as things stand. The Spanish government announced a proposal in January 2025 for a complementary state transfer tax on homes bought by non-resident buyers from outside the EU, framed in the press as a tax of up to 100% of the property value, and a bill was submitted to parliament in May 2025. As of mid-2026 it had not been debated or voted on and is not in force. It remains a proposal, and one worth watching if you are a non-EU buyer, but nobody is being charged it today. Check the position with a Spanish tax adviser before you commit to a purchase.

What is a contrato de arras and how much is the deposit?

It is the private deposit contract signed before completion, fixing the price and the completion date. The deposit is typically around 10% of the price. Which type it is matters enormously: arras penitenciales let either side walk away at a known cost, with the buyer losing the deposit or the seller returning it doubled, while other types can leave you exposed to being sued for performance. Have your own lawyer read it before you sign.

Do I pay the estate agent in Spain?

No. The agent is instructed and paid by the seller, and the commission is already inside the asking price. That is also why the agent is not your adviser, and why you want a lawyer of your own.

How long does it take to buy a property in Valencia?

Four to six weeks from accepted offer to keys is typical for a cash purchase with clean paperwork and an NIE already in hand, and eight to twelve weeks is more realistic with a mortgage, because the valuation, the binding offer and the legally required ten-day reflection period sit inside that window. Missing licences, unregistered extensions or an inheritance in the chain add months.

When do I have to pay the ITP transfer tax?

In the Comunitat Valenciana the self-assessment on Modelo 600 is due within one month of the date of the deed, under article 14 ter of Ley 13/1997. Many guides quote 30 working days, which is the national default and about six weeks, so following it will make you late in Valencia. The tax is not collected at the notary, and the deed cannot be registered until it is paid.

What taxes do I pay every year after buying?

IBI, the council property tax based on the cadastral value, at 0.5784% in Valencia city for 2026, plus your community of owners fees and the separate municipal waste charge that now applies. If you are not a Spanish tax resident you also owe an annual Modelo 210 return on the property, even if it is empty and never rented, taxed on 2% of the cadastral value (1.1% if recently revalued) at 19% for EU, Norwegian, Icelandic and Liechtenstein residents and 24% for everyone else. Budget for a Spanish tax adviser to file it.

Who pays the plusvalía municipal when I buy?

The seller, as a rule. The trap for foreign buyers is that when the seller is a non-resident individual, the buyer becomes the substitute taxpayer, so the town hall can pursue you if the seller leaves without paying. You are also required to withhold 3% of the price on Modelo 211 when the seller is non-resident. The fix is simple and standard: have your lawyer retain both amounts from the money at completion.