Brussels published the Affordable Housing Act yesterday. The most important line in it is not about caps.
Article 3(1): short-term rental restrictions taken on housing affordability grounds "shall not be subject to Directive 2006/123/EC, including the notification obligation laid down in Article 15(7)".
That notification duty is what puts a proposed restriction in front of the Commission before it takes effect. On affordability grounds, it is gone.
What replaces it is a real test. A city has to show a price-to-income ratio of 8 or higher, that ratio rising across 10 years, and that short-term rentals specifically damaged affordability for at least 3 years. Less restrictive options ruled out. Measures capped at 5 years, then reviewed.
And the one operators should be using. Under Article 10(1)(e) a city may only restrict where it already "applies and enforces" the EU registration regime, including taking down unregistered listings. Plenty of cities restrict while barely enforcing. That is now a proportionality failure with a citation attached.
Now the part almost nobody has reported. Article 14: the Regulation does not apply to measures adopted before it enters into force.
Barcelona's 2028 phase-out. Paris. The Athens freeze. No 8x test, no 3-year evidence burden, no 5-year sunset. Every safeguard in this Act is prospective.
And a correction to Tuesday, which is mine to make.
I said the leaked draft opened the door to grandfathering for existing operators. The published text uses that word once, in recital 25, and recital 25 is about property acquisition. Recital 26, the short-term rental one, has none. What hosts actually get is Article 10(2), "appropriate transitional arrangements". A duty on the city, not an exemption for you.
Two figures from the Commission's own Q&A. Activity across the 4 main platforms grew 93% between 2018 and 2024. Central Madrid has around 40 short-term rentals for every 100 homes in the long-term rental market.
The caveat: this is a proposal, COM(2026) 599 final. Parliament and Council next, and the Commission has given no timetable.
The safeguards start when the Act does, and the rules you are already living under are not covered by them.
If your city restricts you tomorrow, your first question is whether it is actually enforcing the registration regime it already has. What is the answer where you operate?
