Walter Finch
THE war on illegal tourist rentals is hotting up as 13 Airbnb hosts in Ibiza have been hit with fines totalling €460,000.
One marketing consultant who advertised three apartments in the same residential building in Roca Llisa received the heftiest sanction of €120,000.
Three apartments in Ibiza town – of which two were owned by the same individual – were fined €40,000 each for serious violations.
Another illegal rental in Sant Francesc, located within the Ses Salines Natural Park, also received a €40,000 fine.
The crackdown aims to curb the proliferation of unlicensed holiday apartments across Ibiza, Sant Josep, Sant Antoni, and Santa Eularia.
The illegal rentals have been blamed for pushing up rents for locals and undercutting the island’s tourism industry.
The local council’s inspection service busted the offenders during checks of the properties.
All the sanctioned rentals lacked the necessary permits and registrations, and their advertising included availability calendars, check-in and check-out instructions, reservation cancellations, and other tourism-related services.
In a statement, the local councillor Mariano Juan commended the inspectors and investigators for their good work in enforcing these regulations.
“We thank them for their involvement in carrying out one of the priority policies for the Island Council: putting an end to illegal behaviour and sending a strong message against those who want to take advantage of the island.”
The clampdown comes hot on the heels of mass protests that broke out in the Canary Islands against ‘tourist massification’, which were repeated across mainland Spain.
The protestors called for a series of measures to be put in place to alleviate the issues being faced by the residents of the islands, which are located off the northwest of Africa.
They include limits on the purchase of properties by foreign buyers in order to combat the shortage of accommodation for locals, an environmental tax, and a freeze on tourist numbers.
One of the focal points of this growing movement against the effects of tourism has been the island of Tenerife, which today saw the biggest turnout of demonstrators.
The slogan of the protests was ‘The Canaries have a limit’, and they were backed with a series of environmental groups including Greenpeace, Ecologists in Action, the WWF, and SEO/Birdlife, among others.
