Ownership Abroad
September 16, 2026
9
Niels Schuit
Household staff in Spain are employed under a specific legal regime, and the owner of the residence is the employer even when the residence is empty for nine months of the year and the owner lives somewhere else. That single fact accounts for most of the difficulties absentee owners run into. A housekeeper who has attended your house every week for six years is not a supplier and cannot be treated as one, whatever the arrangement was called when it began.
This article explains how domestic employment in Spain works in outline, what changes when you are not resident, where the common mistakes sit, and what it costs to do properly. It informs rather than advises. Employment and social security rules change and apply differently to individual circumstances, so take advice from your own labour lawyer or gestor before acting.
The domestic employment regime covers work carried out in or for a private household: housekeeping and cleaning, cooking, childcare and care of dependants, driving, gardening and general household duties, where the work is done for the family rather than for a business. A housekeeper, a nanny, a live in couple, a driver and in many arrangements a gardener all fall within it.
What matters is the substance of the relationship rather than what it is labelled. Where you set the hours, direct the work, provide the equipment and the person attends only your property, the arrangement generally looks like employment regardless of whether an invoice is issued each month. Where you engage an independent professional who is registered as self employed, brings their own equipment, works for several households and organises their own schedule, that is a different relationship. The distinction is not cosmetic, and getting it wrong is the single most expensive error in this area.
Nothing in the law reduces an owner's obligations because they are abroad. What changes is the practical machinery. Registration as an employer, monthly social security contributions, payroll, holiday, sick leave, changes to the minimum wage and any termination all have to be handled continuously from a distance, in Spanish, within Spanish deadlines, usually through a Spanish bank account.
Most owners solve this by appointing a gestor for the administrative filings and, separately, by having somebody locally responsible for the day to day reality of the work: whether the person came, what was done, whether standards are being held, what the house needs. Those are genuinely different roles and it is worth being clear about who holds which. This is the same coordination question that arises across every supplier attending a residence, and we set it out more fully in our article on villa maintenance through the year.
In broad outline, and subject to your own adviser confirming your position, employing domestic staff in Spain involves the following.
The regime has moved closer to general employment law in recent years, including the removal of the old right to dismiss at will and the extension of unemployment cover. Arrangements set up under the earlier rules and never revisited are frequently no longer compliant, which is a good reason to have a long standing arrangement reviewed rather than assumed.
Owners are often surprised less by the wage than by everything around it. As an indication only, and varying by hours, region, experience and the specific terms agreed:
These figures are indicative and actual outcomes differ. The budgeting point is that the true cost of an employee is materially above the headline wage once contributions, extra payments, holiday cover and administration are included, and that it continues through the months the house is empty. Staff costs sit alongside the other fixed items in our note on the annual cost of owning a villa on the Costa del Sol, and they behave much like the standing charges described in our piece on utility bills at a Spanish second home: they do not pause when you leave.
The most common arrangement on this coast is also the least defensible. Somebody has cleaned the house for years, is paid in cash or by transfer without registration, has no contract, and everyone is content until the relationship ends or something happens.
The exposure sits almost entirely with the owner. Unregistered employment carries penalties and liability for unpaid contributions. An accident at the property involving an unregistered worker is a serious matter and one your household insurance is unlikely to answer for. Where a relationship is later recognised as employment, back pay, contributions and termination entitlements can be claimed for the period worked. And the person who has held your keys for years has no formal status, which is uncomfortable for them and unprotected for you.
There is a further point that owners in this segment feel more sharply. An informal arrangement offers no confidentiality framework at all. Nothing has been signed about discretion, about who may enter, about photographs, about guests. Where privacy is part of why you own the residence, that gap matters as much as the legal one, and it connects directly to the key and access discipline set out in our article on security at an unoccupied property.
There are two workable structures and they suit different owners.
Employing directly gives you continuity, loyalty and somebody who knows the house intimately. It also makes you the employer, with the filings, the deadlines, the holiday cover and the termination risk that come with that. It suits owners who spend substantial time at the residence and want the same person present for years.
Engaging services through a management company or an agency places the employment relationship elsewhere. You buy a service to a standard rather than employing a person, cover is arranged when somebody is unwell or on holiday, and vetting, insurance and confidentiality sit with the provider. It suits owners who are absent for long periods and want a defined standard rather than a payroll. It is generally the more expensive option on paper and often the less expensive one in total once administration, cover and risk are counted.
Many owners end up with a combination: a long standing housekeeper employed directly, with everything else, from grounds and pool to arrival preparation, provided as a coordinated service. The local labour market on this stretch of coast is a factor in itself, and knowing it is part of what we bring to the area we work in.
Whoever holds keys to your residence should be documented. That means identity and right to work confirmed, references taken and checked rather than accepted, a written confidentiality undertaking, a defined list of who is permitted to enter and under what circumstances, and a key and code register that is updated when people change. Where the property is let, staff and guests overlap and the standards need to be explicit on both sides, which is why we treat this alongside our note on vetting guests for a holiday let.
Discretion is not achieved by asking for it. It is achieved by documenting it, limiting the number of people who hold access, and knowing at any time who has been in the house and why.
The first thing is that an arrangement inherited with the property does not become yours automatically or safely. Where staff came with the house, the position needs to be established formally rather than continued informally.
The second is that the minimum wage and the contribution rules change, and a contract written some years ago and never revisited may have quietly fallen below the current floor. Somebody has to be watching that on your behalf.
The third is holiday and absence. An employee is entitled to leave, and if your residence needs attending while they are away, the cover has to exist. Owners frequently discover this in August, which is the worst possible month to discover it on this coast.
The fourth is termination. It is the point at which every undocumented year becomes visible at once, and it is the reason to put a proper structure in place while the relationship is good rather than when it is ending.
Payment in cash does not remove the obligation to register the employment and pay contributions, and unregistered domestic work carries penalties for the employer. Discuss your own position with a labour lawyer or gestor.
The domestic employment regime applies from a low threshold of hours, so short weekly arrangements are generally within it. The exact position depends on the facts, which is a question for your adviser.
Either, depending on the relationship. A registered self employed gardener working for several households with their own equipment is a supplier. Someone who attends only your property on hours you set is likely to be an employee.
Workplace risk obligations now extend to domestic employment, and liability questions turn on whether the employment was properly registered and insured. This is precisely the situation an informal arrangement handles badly.
Non-residents can and do employ household staff in Spain, subject to holding the necessary tax identification and administrative arrangements. Your gestor can confirm what is required in your case.
They continue. An employment contract does not pause for the season, which is why the annual cost of a residence should be budgeted on twelve months of staffing rather than on the weeks you are there.
Household staff are the most personal element of running a residence abroad and the one most often handled on trust alone. Trust is not the problem. The absence of structure around it is. A written contract, correct registration, a confidentiality undertaking, documented access and somebody locally responsible for standards protect the person doing the work as much as they protect you.
We look after a limited number of residences on the Costa del Sol, with one point of contact, coordinated suppliers and monthly operational reporting, so that what happens at the house is visible to you without you having to manage it from another country. If you would like to discuss how the staffing and oversight of your residence is currently arranged, request a consultation. For the employment, social security and tax questions raised here, take advice from your own labour lawyer, gestor or tax adviser, since the rules change and apply differently to individual circumstances.
