Buying Property in Moraira in 2026: What a Local Lawyer Actually Tells Clients

So you want to buy a property in Moraira. Good instinct. There is a short list of things that actually decide whether the purchase goes smoothly or quietly costs you money later, and a few of them changed in 2026, so even people who bought recently have old numbers in their head. We made a short video that walks through the whole thing, it is right above. If you would rather read the two-minute version, here it is.

First, who is telling you this. My name is Juan Bertomeu, I am the lawyer here, ICALI 4643, with offices in Moraira and Denia and more than thirty years of purchases behind me. My son Daniel handles the tax side as our adviser. We are not the estate agent, and honestly that one difference is the whole point of what follows.

Yes you can buy here, and you do not even have to fly over

There are no restrictions on a foreigner buying in Spain. EU or not, resident or not, for the purchase itself it is the same. You need two things: a NIE, your Spanish foreigner number, and usually a Spanish bank account. We can arrange both, and with a power of attorney we can handle the whole purchase on your behalf, signing at the notary for you, without you setting foot in Spain. A lot of our British, Dutch and German clients buy exactly that way.

The one habit that protects your money: your own lawyer, not the agent's

I say this to every client, so I will say it to you. Do not use the lawyer the agent or the seller hands you. The agent gets paid when the sale closes, so in practice their lawyer's job is to make it close. That is not the same thing as looking after you.

An independent lawyer does the boring part that actually saves you money. We pull the nota simple to confirm who really owns it and whether there is a debt or a mortgage sitting on it, we check the building licences match what is really built, and we catch the illegal extension or the pool without a licence, which on Costa Blanca villas are far more common than you would think. All of that becomes your problem the day after you sign, if nobody looked before.

Two things that are special to Moraira

Near the water, the Ley de Costas matters. Some homes built before 1988 are not owned outright. They sit on a coastal concession with an expiry date rather than full ownership, and that is a very different thing to buy. If you are near the shore we ask for the coastal certificate on every purchase, because it can change the whole deal.

And a quiet jurisdiction trap: Cumbre del Sol answers to the Benitachell town hall, not Teulada-Moraira, which changes the paperwork and some of the local taxes. A small detail with real consequences. For the full due-diligence checklist, area by area, we keep a deeper local guide on Moraira.Legal.

The 2026 tax change, in one line

On a resale home you pay ITP, the transfer tax, and it dropped this June from 10 to 9 percent in the Comunidad Valenciana. Two things to keep in mind: a higher rate kicks in once the value passes a million euros, and the date that fixes your rate is the day you sign at the notary, not the day you reserve. Brand new homes from a developer pay VAT instead.

One trap worth knowing: the tax is charged on the Catastro's reference value whenever that is higher than the price you paid, so buying cheap does not always lower the bill, and declaring less than you really paid is both illegal and easy for the tax office to catch. The full tax breakdown lives on our non-resident tax page.

After you buy: the yearly bit people forget

Owning here as a non-resident comes with a small yearly tax filing, the Modelo 210, even in the years you never rent the place out and it just sits there for you. Add the IBI, the rubbish tax, and community fees if you are in a community. People forget the 210, and then an ugly letter arrives. It is one of the quiet things we handle for owners all year round.

The quiet reason a lot of people buy here: inheritance

This one surprises people, and it is genuinely good news. In the Valencian Community, when your closest family inherits, a spouse, children or parents, they get a very large reduction on inheritance tax, on top of a per-heir allowance. On a normal Moraira home that can take the bill from tens of thousands down to almost nothing. And those regional reductions apply to non-residents too, not just to residents.

One honest caveat for British owners after Brexit. The position is cleanest for heirs in the EU. For the UK the courts have extended the same treatment, but it is a greyer area in real practice, so plan it properly and make a Spanish will for your Spanish assets. It makes the whole thing far simpler for your family later. The detail is on our inheritance and family transfers page.

And no, the Golden Visa is not a route anymore. Spain ended it in April 2025, so buying a property no longer gets you residency.

We are right here

If you are buying, or just turning the idea over, that is exactly what we do, from the office here in Moraira and a second one in Denia. If you are on this coast you are about twenty minutes away. If you are abroad, we work online and by power of attorney all the time.

Want the deeper version? Read our full guide to buying property in Spain, the local Moraira.Legal guides, or run your own numbers in the property cost estimator. Or just send us a message and one of us will tell you the honest next step. We have been doing this since 1991.