Dénia now has 10 tourist apartments for every hotel place

What direction is the tourist accommodation model in Dénia going? For now, like in a lot of other cities, tourist apartments are the form of housing that has grown the […]

November 5, 2025 2 Mins Read

What direction is the tourist accommodation model in Dénia going? For now, like in a lot of other cities, tourist apartments are the form of housing that has grown the most in recent years. Even more so in this area. The three biggest towns of the Marina Alta—Dénia, Xàbia, and Calp—are home to one out of every six tourist apartments in the Valencian Community. There are already more than 16,000 of them in the whole area.

The most recent information from the tourist accommodation registry of Turisme Comunitat Valenciana says that Dénia has 4,970 places for tourists to stay. This number is exactly double the number of hotel beds in the city, which was 2,480 this summer.

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But keep in mind that the comparison is between beds and accommodations. And how many beds are there in the 4,970 tourist apartments in Dénia? Dataestur says that the average number of people who can stay in a tourist hotel in Spain right now is 5. So, if we use this amount for the Marina Alta region, there would be about 24,850 beds in tourist accommodations in Dénia. That’s ten times more than the 2,480 hotel beds that were available in Dénia last summer.

These numbers definitely change the way tourists stay in a city like Dénia in a big way, in addition to the other repercussions that come from the rise of tourist apartments. In recent years, many homes, flats, and even businesses have been turned into this model. This has made it harder to find housing and made it harder to rent a place to live for a year.

Because of these repercussions, the Dénia City Council is thinking of taking steps to stop the spread of tourist apartments. For now, while these decisions are being made, the issuing of new compatibility certifications for launching these kinds of rentals has been put on hold since last year. And the moratorium has already cut down on their numbers, just like it has in other municipalities in the area.

But the last steps still need to be decided. To do this, the City Council asked the University of Alicante to do a study that suggests limiting the number of tourist accommodations in each neighbourhood. These restrictions would be between 30 and 50 units per 100 people, depending on the neighbourhood.