Aro bay housing market: third-quarter 2026 review.

1. Macro and interest rates

The European Central Bank raised its three policy rates by 25 basis points at its meeting of 10 September 2026, effective 16 September: deposit facility 2.50%, main refinancing 2.65%, marginal lending 2.90%. It was the second increase of 2026, reversing part of the 2024–25 easing cycle, and it was taken against euro-area inflation of 3.3% in August and oil prices near 100 dollars a barrel on Middle-East tensions. The next decisions are due on 29 October and 17 December.

Spain's flash CPI for September 2026, published on 29 September, was 4.9% year on year, up from 4.3% in August and the highest since February 2023; core inflation was 3.1% and the harmonised index 5.0%. The INE attributes the rise mainly to motor fuels, which fell a year earlier and rose this year, and to package holidays falling less than in September 2025. For a housing market this matters twice: it keeps the ECB in tightening mode, and it erodes the real value of fixed-rate debt taken out in 2024–25.

The 12-month Euribor, the reference for most Spanish variable mortgages, averaged 3.243% in September 2026 (2.954% in August, 2.172% in September 2025) and closed the month at 3.362% on 30 September. A borrower with a 300,000 € variable mortgage over 25 years at Euribor + 0.30 saw the monthly payment move from about 1,342 € at last year's rate to about 1,509 € at this September's average, an increase of roughly 167 € a month on the annual reset.

Source: Banco de España / ECB, decision of 10 September 2026.

2. Prices: from the national index to the street

The INE house price index (IPV), built from registry prices, rose 12.2% year on year in the second quarter of 2026, down 0.7 points from the 12.9% of the first quarter. Second-hand homes rose 12.9%, new homes 7.4%. On the quarter the index rose 3.4% (second-hand +3.7%, new +1.0%). Catalonia's annual rate was 10.1%. The series has now risen for 45 consecutive quarters. The slight deceleration in the annual rate is the first since 2023 and is consistent with what the portals show locally.

Registry prices confirm the level: the Colegio de Registradores reports an average of 2,487 €/m² for homes sold in Q2 2026 nationally, +2.4% on the quarter. The average mortgage on a home purchase reached 176,453 €, a historical maximum.

Girona province asking prices on idealista reached 2,913 €/m² in August 2026, +10.1% in a year and within five euros of the province's May 2007 peak of 2,918 €/m². Within the province the picture is uneven: Palamós +16.4%, Girona city +9.1%, Lloret de Mar +8.5%, Castell-Platja d'Aro +7.1%, Sant Feliu de Guíxols +7.1%, Begur +3.3%. The two municipalities we cover sit in the middle of that range and were both slightly down on the month (−0.3% and −1.0%) and on the quarter (−0.5% and −0.8%): the summer did not add to prices here.

Asking prices of homes advertised on idealista. Monthly and quarterly changes shown where published for our two municipalities.

RealAdvisor's price model, which blends listings, closed sales and registry data, puts Castell-Platja d'Aro at 4,480 €/m² in September 2026 (apartments 4,639 €/m², +10.8% in a year; houses 4,063 €/m², +6.7%) and Sant Feliu de Guíxols at 3,323 €/m² (apartments 3,261 €/m², +11.0%; houses 3,456 €/m², +8.1%). Apartments have outpaced houses in both municipalities for two years, which is the lock-and-leave premium paid by second-home buyers on the front line.

Our own snapshot of habitaclia on 1 October 2026 (1,541 listing cards across the four towns) gives the medians a buyer actually meets. The spread between the towns is the main fact of this market: a median apartment in S'Agaró asks 5,509 €/m², one in Sant Feliu 3,051 €/m², and the two are twelve minutes apart by car.

Asking prices; medians by property type from the listing cards; 'For sale' is the portal's own count per town. Rentals are long-term lets advertised, not tourist lets.

3. Transactions and demand

Spain registered 167,934 home sales in the second quarter of 2026, −2.3% year on year (new homes 34,919, −11.5% on the quarter; second-hand 133,015, −4.0% on the quarter), according to the Colegio de Registradores. idealista's reading of the same registry data puts the first half at about 346,000 sales, −1.9% on the first half of 2025. Volume is softening from a high base while prices rise, the classic late-cycle combination of scarce supply and pricier money.

Foreign buyers accounted for 15.98% of purchases nationally in Q2 2026. Girona province was at 25.48%, the highest share in Catalonia (regional average 17.63%) and well above the Spanish average, though below Alicante, Málaga and the Balearics. By nationality the largest groups nationally were British (6.99% of foreign purchases), Dutch (6.94%), German (6.11%), Moroccan (6.09%) and Romanian (5.70%); 57.4% of foreign buyers came from the European Union, 16.8% from the rest of Europe and 8.8% from Africa. On the Aro bay the French, Dutch, German, Belgian and Swiss are the active second-home buyers, with a steady UK and, since 2022, Ukrainian presence.

Mortgage data give the same picture. The INE counted 43,372 home mortgages in July 2026, −3.5% year on year and −5.5% on June, with an average loan of 180,785 € (+10.9%). The average initial rate was 3.01% (fixed 3.03%, up from 2.89% in June; variable 2.97%), the fixed share 62.3% and the average term 26 years. Catalonia bucked the national trend with +4.9% more home mortgages than in July 2025. The Registradores' Q2 figures (average mortgage 176,453 €, rate 3.03%, term 25.7 years, fixed share 63.8%, down 3.3 points on the quarter) show buyers starting to drift back to variable and mixed products as fixed rates rise.

4. Supply and inventory

Inventory is thin relative to demand and heavily skewed to apartments. Platja d'Aro's 742 listings are the deepest market on the bay and include most of the new-build supply; Sant Feliu's 599 are older stock at a third lower price per square metre; S'Agaró's 125 and Castell d'Aro's 71 are small, illiquid markets where one or two sales set the comparables. New-build was 5.8% of the cards we sampled (84 listings), concentrated in Platja d'Aro (59) and in a single twelve-flat building in Castell d'Aro.

Price bands tell the buyer where the competition is. In Platja d'Aro the median apartment asks 395,000 € and the median house 1.1 M€; in S'Agaró 450,000 € and 1.39 M€. The front line and the new-build towers on the Passeig Marítim now ask 9,000–11,000 €/m², more than double the municipal median: the gap between a good street and an average one is the largest it has been.

Public supply is beginning to appear but will not change the arithmetic before 2028: Platja d'Aro's council has announced 40 new flats within two years, none eligible for tourist licences, and Sant Feliu de Guíxols is building 70 public rental homes on the former Trachsler cork-factory plots (3,255 m² of land, 5,403 m² buildable, a project of more than six million euros with a three-to-four-year horizon from 2025). See the new-developments report for the private pipeline.

5. The rental market

Long-term rental supply is the scarcest asset on the bay: 93 homes advertised across four towns on 1 October against 1,537 for sale, a ratio of one to sixteen. Platja d'Aro (47) and Sant Feliu (30) carry almost all of it; Castell d'Aro had a single advertised let. The cause is structural: about 3,000 tourist-flat licences exist in Platja d'Aro for roughly 1,400 flats actually in tourist use, and a further 370 flats stand empty, according to the figures the mayor gave in August.

Sant Feliu de Guíxols is a declared tensioned housing area under the Catalan housing law, which brings rent caps for new contracts by reference to the official index, and both municipalities fall under the November 2023 Catalan decree that limits tourist licences to 10 per 100 inhabitants in 262 municipalities, with a five-year transition that ends in November 2028. Platja d'Aro's mayor has said the council does not intend to cut licences but will act 'like an estate agency' to bring empty flats to the long-term market through IBI exemptions, subsidies and the conversion of closed commercial premises.

6. Regulation and tax

• Transfer tax (ITP) on second-hand homes in Catalonia is a progressive scale since June 2025: 10% up to 600,000 €, 11% to 900,000 €, 12% to 1.5 M€ and 13% above. New homes pay 10% VAT plus 1.5% stamp duty (AJD).
• Tourist licences (HUT): decree of 7 November 2023, 262 municipalities, cap of 10 licences per 100 inhabitants, five-year transition to November 2028; about 95,000 flats affected in Catalonia. Platja d'Aro holds roughly 3,000 licences.
• Tensioned housing areas: Sant Feliu de Guíxols is declared; rent caps on new contracts apply. Castell-Platja d'Aro is not declared as of 1 October 2026.
• Non-EU buyers: the Government's proposed 100% tax on purchases by non-resident non-EU buyers has stalled in Congress after Junts withdrew its support (March 2026). Non-EU buyers continue to purchase under the existing rules; the political risk has not disappeared and the next general election is due by August 2027.
• Planning: Platja d'Aro's council gave provisional approval on 21 September 2026 to the Pla Especial 'Mas Maig', a planning instrument for that sector; final approval rests with the Generalitat.

7. Outlook

Base case

Local asking prices flat to slightly down through the winter, closing the year 5–8% above December 2025; registry-based indices still showing double digits until the spring agreements wash through. Transactions down mid-single digits on 2025 with longer marketing periods above one million euros. The Euribor between 3.2% and 3.6% through the first quarter of 2027 unless the oil shock reverses. Rental supply stays scarce; tourist-licence values hold.

Risks

• Upside to prices: a resolution of the Middle-East oil shock would pull the Euribor back under 3% and release pent-up mortgage demand into a thin market.
• Downside to prices: a third ECB rise in October plus a weak winter for the euro area would push variable-rate owners of 2021–22 purchases to sell; the 300,000–600,000 € apartment band is the most exposed.
• Policy: a revived non-EU purchase tax, or the extension of tensioned-area status to Castell-Platja d'Aro, would hit the top of the market and the rental market respectively.

For buyers

Fix or mix the financing before 29 October; the best fixed offers (around 2.1–2.75% TIN with linked products) are still below the Euribor and will not last if the ECB moves again. Negotiate on second-hand stock that has been listed since spring: the portals show prices flat since June, so a listing at a spring price is overpriced by the summer's inflation. Value this autumn is in houses in Castell d'Aro and upper Sant Feliu, where the same budget buys land, and in well-located second-hand apartments priced below the new-build towers.

For sellers

Price to the three most recent comparable sales, not to the INE headline. Expect a mortgage-dependent buyer below 700,000 € and an equity buyer above one million euros, and prepare the file for both: energy certificate, habitability certificate, community minutes, licence status. If the property has a tourist licence, document it; it is part of the value until 2028.

8. Methodology

National and regional prices: INE Índice de Precios de Vivienda (registry-based, quarterly). Transactions and foreign buyers: Colegio de Registradores, Estadística Registral Inmobiliaria, Q2 2026. Mortgages: INE Estadística de Hipotecas (July 2026, published 28 September). Rates: ECB decisions via Banco de España; 12-month Euribor monthly averages. Local asking prices: idealista price reports (August 2026) and RealAdvisor price model (September 2026). Inventory and medians: Emerald's own snapshot of habitaclia on 1 October 2026 (1,541 listing cards; medians computed per property type from price and built area; the portal's own counts used for totals). Regulation: Generalitat de Catalunya decrees, Platja d'Aro and Sant Feliu council communications as reported by Ràdio Capital. Mortgage offers: HelpMyCash comparison, 30 September 2026. All figures are as published on the dates stated; portal data are asking prices, not transactions.

Sources and data

• INE — Índice de Precios de Vivienda, Q2 2026 (7 September 2026)
• INE — Estadística de Hipotecas, July 2026 (28 September 2026)
• INE — Indicador adelantado del IPC, September 2026 (29 September 2026)
• Colegio de Registradores — Estadística Registral Inmobiliaria, Q2 2026
• Banco de España — El BCE sube los tipos 25 puntos básicos, September 2026
• idealista — Informes de precio de la vivienda, August 2026 (Girona province and municipalities)
• RealAdvisor — Precio de la vivienda en Castell-Platja d'Aro, September 2026
• HelpMyCash — Mejores hipotecas, 30 September 2026
• Ràdio Capital — Platja d'Aro tourist licences and housing plan (29 August 2026); Sant Feliu public housing (2024)
• Generalitat de Catalunya — Decret llei 3/2023 on tourist housing (7 November 2023)
• Emerald Properties — habitaclia snapshot of the four towns, 1 October 2026 (1,541 listing cards)

This material is general market information prepared by Emerald Properties S.L. from the public sources listed. It is not investment, legal or tax advice and not a valuation of any specific property. Figures are those published by the sources on the dates stated and may be revised; portal snapshots count asking prices, not closed sales.