Licencia de primera ocupación: the Spanish permit utilities ask for

The deed is signed, the keys are yours, and the electricity company will not open an account. The document it wants has four names in Spain and a different law behind each.

The licencia de primera ocupación is the municipal confirmation that a finished building may be lived in. Spain's regions run it differently: Catalonia and the Balearic Islands issue a cédula de habitabilidad with an expiry date, Valencia and Andalusia now work with a declaración responsable filed at the town hall, and in all four the utilities may not connect a home without it.

Catalonia: a cédula with a 25 or 15 year life

Catalonia's housing act, Ley 18/2007 del derecho a la vivienda, states in article 26 that a home needs the cédula de habitabilidad before it may be occupied, that in any sale, letting or transfer of use, including second and later transfers, the seller must hand over a valid cédula, and that electricity, water, gas and telecom companies must demand it before contracting supply. Article 26.5 bis adds a warning worth reading twice: the cédula only certifies technical habitability and does not legalise a building under planning law, and where a doubt about planning legality surfaces, it must be noted on the cédula and the notary must tell the buyer. Article 132 obliges the notary to demand the cédula before authorising a transfer, unless the buyer expressly exonerates the seller because the home is to be renovated or demolished or will not be used as a dwelling.

The Generalitat's Decret 141/2012 fills in the detail. Article 8 names three kinds, first occupation for new builds, second occupation for existing homes and first occupation after rehabilitation, and article 9 gives the cédula a life of 25 years for new construction and 15 years for second occupation and rehabilitation. Article 11 repeats the utilities rule, and article 13 makes the Agència de l'Habitatge de Catalunya the issuer. The agency's second occupation procedure requires a habitability certificate signed by an architect or technical architect, charges 20.90 euros per dwelling in person or 14.65 euros online, and resolves within 30 working days.

How long a cédula de habitabilidad stays valid

Region and type	Validity (years)
Catalonia, new build		+25years
Catalonia, second occupation		+15years
Valencia, renewal cycle		+10years
Balearic Islands		+10years

Valencia: a licence that has to be renewed, filed as a declaration

The Valencian housing act, Ley 8/2004 de la Vivienda, makes the municipal licencia de ocupación a condition for occupying a home in article 5 and forbids water, electricity, gas and telecom companies from contracting and starting supply without proof of it. The building quality act, Ley 3/2004, LOFCE, sets the clock in article 33.2: ten years after the first licence, a renewal is needed on the second or any later transfer of the property and whenever a new water, gas or electricity contract has to be signed, and article 34 makes the renewal depend on a technician's certificate that the home still meets the conditions of the earlier licence. Article 16 of the housing act lists the licence among the documents a seller of a finished home must deliver, and articles 17 and 18 make it a condition for letting.

The procedure changed with the planning code. Article 233 of the consolidated TRLOTUP, Decreto Legislativo 1/2021, subjects the first occupation of completed buildings and the second and subsequent acts of occupation of dwellings to a declaración responsable rather than a licence, filed at the town hall with the technician's certificate. The licence still exists as the document the utilities and the notary look for; the way of obtaining it is now a declaration.

Andalusia: a declaración responsable the utilities must see

Andalusia's territorial act, the LISTA, Ley 7/2021, puts the occupation and use of buildings under a declaración responsable in article 138: point d) for buildings completed under a licence or a works declaration and matching them, and point e) for existing buildings on urban land that conform to planning, or are in the legal situation of fuera de ordenación, and have not been altered. Article 142 is the enforcement lever. Utility companies may only sign a provisional contract against the works licence, and only sign the definitive contract for electricity, water, gas or telecoms against the licencia de ocupación o utilización, the declaración responsable or the communication, with the documents attached to it. The same article accepts, in their place, the administrative resolution declaring a building asimilado a fuera de ordenación, or the certification for buildings finished before the 1975 land law.

The Balearic Islands: a ten year cédula from the island council

On the islands the document is again a cédula de habitabilidad, regulated by Decret 145/1997 and issued by each Consell Insular. Article 7 of the decree bars the contracting of water, sewerage, electricity, gas and telephone services for a building, home or premises without a cédula in force, article 8 names three kinds, first occupation, renewal and carència for works finished before 1 March 1987, and article 13 makes every cédula expire ten years after issue regardless of who owns or occupies the home. The Consell Insular de Menorca charges 25.24 euros per dwelling for a renewal cédula, on the strength of a technician's certificate and a dated photograph.

What a foreign buyer should do with all this

Ask for the document by its regional name before the arras, not after the deed: cédula in Catalonia and the Balearics, licencia or declaración responsable de ocupación in Valencia, declaración responsable de ocupación o utilización in Andalusia. Check its date against the region's validity period, since an expired cédula is a missing one for the utilities. Remember article 26.5 bis of the Catalan act: a valid cédula is not proof that the building or the extension was ever permitted, and the nota simple from the land registry is the place where planning notes and charges surface. The other Spanish document check that catches buyers unaware, the occupation status of the property itself, is covered in our guide to checking okupa risk.

Get the occupation document and its date from the seller with the nota simple, and let the region's law tell you whether it is still alive. AiMYNDi reads both against the regional rules and flags an expired or missing licence next to the price.