More than 9.200 properties left the holiday-rental sector in one year, but they did not reappear on the long-term rental market. Where did they go and what does this reveal to international property investors?
Lujy 15, 2026
The Canary Islands property market is sending investors a signal that headline figures alone cannot explain.
A recent report by Radio Club Tenerife, part of Cadena SER, raised a direct question: what happened to the thousands of properties that disappeared from the Canary Islands’ holiday-rental market?
Between May 2025 and May 2026, the number of holiday rentals reportedly fell from 47.648 to 38.377.
That means 9.271 properties left the sector in twelve months. Yet they do not appear to have returned to the conventional residential rental market.
During the same period, average rents in the Canary Islands increased by 8% year-on-year, exceeding €16 per square metre. Rental prices have now risen for 55 consecutive months.
So where did the properties go?
Leaving the Holiday-Rental Market Is Not the Same as Becoming a Long-Term Rental
The assumption sounds logical: Fewer holiday rentals should mean more homes for residents, greater supply and lower rents.
The market is telling a different story.
A property removed from the holiday-rental sector does not automatically become available to a local family under a conventional long-term tenancy. Some properties may have been sold. Others may be occupied directly by their owners, kept vacant or moved into different rental models. One particularly relevant alternative is the temporary and medium-term rental market.
This segment can serve:
- digital nomads and remote professionals;
- corporate transferees and project-based workers;
- executives temporarily based on the islands;
- affluent retirees spending several months in the Canary Islands;
- international clients relocating or testing the market before purchasing.
These homes are no longer advertised as holiday accommodation, but neither are they available through the traditional residential rental market.
They have not disappeared. They have moved.
Why Counting Properties Is Not Enough
Knowing that 9.271 homes left one market segment is useful. It is not sufficient. Serious property analysis must establish their next destination.
Were they sold?
Are they being used as second homes?
Have they moved into seasonal or temporary rentals?
Are they being held off the market?
Are some located in tourist complexes or areas that are poorly suited to permanent residential demand?
Without these answers, it is premature to assume that reducing holiday rentals must increase long-term housing supply or cause prices to fall.
Property markets are not perfectly connected containers.
Owners generally move their assets towards the option offering the most attractive balance between income, flexibility, legal certainty and risk.
This helps explain why thousands of properties can leave the holiday-rental sector without producing a significant increase in residential availability.
What This Means for Canary Islands Property Investors
For international investors, the lesson is not that every property represents an opportunity.
The lesson is that there is no single Canary Islands property market—and no universal rental strategy.
An effective investment decision must consider:
- the specific island, municipality and neighbourhood;
- the target tenant;
- the expected duration of occupancy;
- local and planning regulations;
- operating and management costs;
- realistic net returns;
- the depth and sustainability of local demand.
Buying “a property in the Canary Islands” is not a strategy.
The real questions are more precise:
Who will occupy it?
For how long?
Under which contractual structure?
Why should that demand remain stable?
An apartment suitable for a remote professional in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria may not satisfy the same demand as a property designed for affluent seasonal residents in southern Tenerife. The location may be attractive in both cases, but the income model, tenant profile, management requirements and risks can be entirely different. The opportunity lies in matching the right property with the right demand—not in following a generic narrative about the Canary Islands.
And What About the Predicted Price Collapse?
As Fabio Chinellato of InfoCanarie observes: “A collapse in Canary Islands property prices has been predicted since 2020. It still has not happened.” Even the disappearance of more than 9,000 holiday rentals has not generated the correction many observers expected.
Why?
Because demand has not disappeared. It has evolved and fragmented.
Because properties can change their economic use without returning to the conventional rental market.
Because part of the demand remains international.
And because not every property is suitable—or available—for permanent residential use.
Before predicting another imminent collapse, the more intelligent question is still the original one:
Where did these properties actually go?
Think. Observe. Above all, study the market.
Or have the situation properly analysed by professionals who understand it.
By "InfoCanarie" - InfoCanarie Promotion and Consulting Founder
Since 1999, InfoCanarie has been supporting entrepreneurs, investors and families in real estate investment, business internationalization, company setup and the development of economic activities in the Canary Islands.
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