What Selling Your Marbella Home Really Costs (September 2026)

If you are not a Spanish tax resident, the buyer of your home is legally required to withhold 3% of the purchase price at completion and pay it to the tax office within a month, using form Modelo 211. On a €1,000,000 sale, €30,000 of your proceeds does not arrive with the rest.

This is not an extra tax; it is an advance on your capital gains bill. You then declare the actual gain through Modelo 210, the retention is credited against what you owe, and if the retention exceeds the tax, you can claim the difference back. Sellers who sold with little or no gain routinely recover most or all of it; the refund takes patience, but it comes. The mistake is not the 3% itself, it is not knowing about it when you planned what the sale would fund next.

The main cost of selling is tax on your gain: broadly, what you sell for minus what you paid, with an important refinement in your favour. Your acquisition price counts including the costs and taxes you paid when you bought, and documented improvements to the property increase it further. Renovated the kitchen with invoices to show for it? That spending reduces today's taxable gain. Lost the invoices? It does not.

Non-residents pay a flat 19% on the net gain. Spanish tax residents pay on a sliding scale that currently runs from 19% to 30% depending on the size of the gain, with exemptions that can eliminate the bill entirely in some cases, such as reinvesting the proceeds of your main home or selling a main home when over 65. Residents of the EU and EEA who sell what was their main home in Spain can also qualify for a reinvestment exemption. Which of these applies to you is precisely the conversation to have with a tax advisor before you list, not after you sign.

Separate from capital gains tax, the municipality levies its own tax on the increase in the land value while you owned it, the plusvalía municipal. Since the 2021 reform, there are two calculation methods, your advisor picks the cheaper, and, importantly, no tax is due at all if you sell without a real gain. The amount varies with the municipality, the land value and your years of ownership; it is usually a modest figure next to the capital gains tax, but it is not zero and it belongs in your arithmetic.

One practical note for non-resident sellers: because the tax office cannot chase you abroad, the buyer is legally the fallback payer, so in practice an amount for plusvalía is often retained at completion alongside the 3%. Your lawyer arranges this cleanly; it should never be a surprise.

Beyond the taxes, the largest cost is usually the agency fee. In Spain it is paid by the seller, and in this market it typically runs in the region of 5% of the sale price plus VAT, agreed in your listing contract, so unlike the taxes above, you know it in advance. What that fee should buy is the subject of its own conversation: pricing strategy, presentation, access to qualified international buyers, and a negotiation that earns its keep. Ask any agency to make that case before you sign; we happily make ours.

The rest is small and mostly administrative. An energy performance certificate is required to sell and costs little. If a mortgage is still registered on the property, even one you paid off years ago, it must be formally cancelled at the notary and registry before completion, a modest cost that takes weeks, so start early. And your lawyer's fee for a sale is typically lighter than on a purchase.

A non-resident owner sells at €1,000,000. The agency fee at 5% plus VAT comes to €60,500, and, usefully, that fee is deductible from the sale value when calculating the taxable gain, one more reason to keep every invoice. Say the net taxable gain, after acquisition costs, documented improvements and the deductible selling costs, works out at €300,000: capital gains tax at 19% is €57,000. The buyer already withheld €30,000 at completion (the 3% retention), so the seller settles the remaining €27,000 through Modelo 210, plus the plusvalía for their municipality and the administrative items. All-in for this stylised case: roughly €120,000 between fee, taxes and sundries before the net proceeds land. Real cases differ in every direction, which is exactly why the tax advisor comes before the listing, not after the offer.

Three things, all before the For Sale sign. Dig out your purchase escritura and every invoice for improvements, because each documented euro reduces the taxable gain. Ask for the full net-proceeds calculation, so you know what actually lands in your account at completion, retention included. And have the property ready to answer a buyer's lawyer: licences, community certificates, energy certificate, mortgage cancellation underway. Sellers who prepare this way close faster and negotiate from strength; the ones who improvise lose weeks exactly when a buyer is ready.

Thinking of selling this autumn? We prepare the whole picture with you before the listing goes live: realistic pricing for today's market, the net-proceeds arithmetic with the right tax advisor at the table, and presentation that does your home justice. Sell with us, or contact us for the conversation that starts with numbers rather than promises.

Start with the net number →