Update 03.10.2026: Congress repealed Royal Decree-law 26/2026 on 2 October (BOE-A-2026-20526): the 10% state rent tax deduction in Spain for 2026 does not apply. More in the news on the repeal.
Royal Decree-law 26/2026 provided for a rent tax deduction in Spain for 2026. Tenants of a main home could subtract 10% of the rent paid from their tax if their base imponible was below €33,007.20 a year. The decree was published in the BOE on 30 September and came into force on 1 October, but Congress repealed it on 2 October and the deduction does not apply.
What changes for you today
Nothing. The 10% state deduction does not apply, so you do not have to file or change anything for it. IRPF is Spain's personal income tax, the one on the Renta return. The rules of your lease (deposit, extension, rent rises) are in our guide to tenant rights for foreigners, without the changes of the repealed decree. If you pay rent in the Comunitat Valenciana, that region has its own deduction: it is in our guide to Valencian deductions in the Renta.
What happened
Royal Decree-law 26/2026, the Government's urgent housing package, was dated 29 September. A royal decree-law is a rule with the force of law that the Government passes by urgency, without going through Parliament first. The BOE published it on 30 September and, under its own text, it came into force on 1 October.
In Article 6, within the tax measures on housing, the decree changed the IRPF law. It added the rent deduction as paragraph 6 of Article 68, adjusted Article 67.1 so that the deduction came off the state part of the tax, and completed the fifteenth transitional provision.
Congress had to vote on the decree within 30 days of its promulgation and could validate (confirm) or repeal it (Article 86 of the Constitution). On 2 October 2026 it agreed to repeal it, according to the resolution published in BOE no. 245 (BOE-A-2026-20526). The BOE's analysis says the decree's amendments and additions lose effect. The same day Congress repealed Royal Decree-law 27/2026, on rental contracts (BOE-A-2026-20527).
The changes to the rental contract that the same package brought (extension, rent-rise cap, temporary lets and evictions) also lost effect: they are in our earlier article and in the news on the repeal. This one covers only the tax side.
How it works now
- State deduction: without the decree, it only survives, as a transitional regime, for contracts signed before 1 January 2015 (fifteenth transitional provision). According to the AEAT help page (the Tax Agency), you must have been entitled to the deduction before that date and still have the contract in force.
- Comunitat Valenciana: it has its own rent deduction (Article 4.Uno.n of Law 13/1997). It gives 20% of the rent with a cap of €800, and 25% (cap €950) or 30% (cap €1,100) if you meet personal conditions set by that law. The base limit is €30,000 (€47,000 for a joint return). The figures come from the AEAT 2025 tax return manual. Other regions have different rules.
- Your lease: its rules are in our guide to tenant rights for foreigners, without the changes of the repealed decree.
What would change
The decree provided for these tax rules for tenants. None of them applies, because Congress repealed it.
- Who: tenants of a main home with a base imponible (the figure on the return that the rule uses) below €33,007.20 a year.
- How much: 10% of the rent paid in the year, with a cap on the part of the rent that counted. With a base imponible of €23,007.20 or less, at most €11,630 of rent a year counted, so the deduction was up to €1,163. Between €23,007.20 and €33,007.20 that maximum fell, and with €33,007.20 or more there was no deduction.
- Another home within 50 km: for at least half of the year, neither the tenant nor anyone in the family unit (the group you file with) could have another home less than 50 km from the rented one, unless an administrative or court decision prevented its use as a residence.
- Part of the tax: the deduction came off the state part of the IRPF, the part that goes to the State and not to your region (Article 67.1).
- Landlords: the decree also changed the tax reduction for people who let out a home (Article 23 of the IRPF law). Those changes also lost effect.
What happens next
- The decree is repealed: the 10% state deduction does not apply and the changes it made to the IRPF law lose effect (BOE-A-2026-20526).
- We do not know what happens to anything done between 1 and 2 October. The text of the repeal does not say.
- This article does not predict whether there will be another rule on this deduction: we do not know whether the Government will present one.
- The AEAT note of 30 September on the decree is still online and does not mention the repeal (checked on 3 October 2026). What the BOE says prevails.
What you can do
- Do not count on the decree's deduction in your 2026 Renta, the one filed in 2027.
- If you signed or applied for something relying on the decree between 1 and 2 October, check it with a professional.
- If you live in the Comunitat Valenciana and pay rent, look at its deduction in our guide and in the AEAT tax return manual. Keep the lease and the bank proof of each payment.
- Follow the IRPF news on the AEAT site.
Official source: Resolution of 2 October 2026 repealing Royal Decree-law 26/2026 (BOE-A-2026-20526) and the repealed decree, Royal Decree-law 26/2026 of 29 September (BOE-A-2026-20266), Article 6.
Informational only; check the official source and a professional for your specific case.