The short answer
A four-to-six bedroom villa in a gated Marbella urbanisation, kept properly and used seasonally, runs somewhere between €35,000 and €90,000 a year before any staff live on site. The same house with a resident housekeeper and caretaker passes €150,000.
That spread is not vagueness. It is driven by three decisions the owner makes: how much garden there is, whether anyone lives in the house, and whether the property sits inside a gated estate with shared infrastructure.
The rest of this page is those lines, separately, so the number can be built for a specific house rather than guessed for a category.
Taxes that arrive whether you visit or not
IBI (Impuesto sobre Bienes Inmuebles) — the annual municipal property tax, charged as a percentage of the cadastral value rather than the market value. On a villa whose market value is €2M to €5M, expect roughly €1,500 to €4,500 a year. It is the owner's liability regardless of whether the property is let, and it transfers with the property if unpaid.
Basura and other municipal charges — refuse collection and similar, a few hundred euros a year.
Imputed income tax for non-residents (IRNR) — the line foreign owners most often discover late. A Spanish property that is not let and is at your disposal is deemed to generate income. The taxable base is 1.1% or 2% of the cadastral value depending on when that value was last revised, taxed at 19% for residents of the EU, Iceland and Norway and 24% for everyone else. It is modest in absolute terms — commonly a few hundred to a couple of thousand euros — but it is an annual filing obligation, and failure to file is what creates the problem rather than the tax itself.
Patrimonio (wealth tax) — Andalucia applies a full bonification for residents of the Autonomous Community, so residents typically pay nothing. Non-residents are assessed on Spanish assets above the allowance at progressive rates. On a €3M property held by a non-resident with no other Spanish assets, this is meaningful money and worth structuring for before purchase, not after.
None of these depend on how often you fly in. They are the floor.
The estate: community fees
Almost every villa worth owning here sits in a gated urbanisation, and that carries a cuota de comunidad — the community fee covering perimeter security, road maintenance, shared gardens and, where they exist, communal pools and gatehouses.
Range for villa urbanisations: €200 to €1,500 a month, so €2,400 to €18,000 a year.
The top of that range is not arbitrary. Estates with manned security around the clock, private roads over difficult terrain, and their own infrastructure cost more to run, and La Zagaleta — with two private golf courses, a helipad, an equestrian centre and a full security perimeter — sits well above ordinary urbanisation fees for exactly that reason.
The fee is worth reading as information rather than as a cost. It tells you what is actually maintained, and a suspiciously low fee on a large estate usually means deferred maintenance that arrives later as a derrama, a special assessment.
Keeping the house standing: utilities and maintenance
Electricity — €5,000 to €15,000 a year for a large villa running air conditioning through the summer. Heating demand is minimal by northern European standards; cooling is the driver, along with pool pumps and, if present, an underfloor system.
Water — €2,000 to €6,000 a year, dominated almost entirely by garden irrigation. A mature Mediterranean garden on a hillside plot in August is thirsty, and this is the line that separates a €35,000 house from a €90,000 one more than any other.
Pool maintenance — €150 to €350 a month, so €1,800 to €4,200 a year for a normal villa pool serviced weekly. Saltwater systems run cheaper on chemicals.
Garden and grounds — €1,500 to €4,000 a month for a full service team on a mature garden, and this is genuinely year-round work in a subtropical climate. A small, modern, low-planting plot can be a fraction of that.
Insurance — €2,500 to €6,000 a year for building, contents and liability on a €3M to €5M villa.
Reserve for capital items — not an invoice but a discipline. Pool linings, air conditioning plant, roof and terrace waterproofing, and exterior render all have finite lives, and the coastal salt air shortens them. A percent of value a year, set aside, keeps these from becoming events.
Staffing, and the legal part of it
Staffing is the single most variable line, and the one with legal consequences if handled casually.
Light — external cleaning three or four days a week, plus pool and garden services: roughly €25,000 to €40,000 a year, with nobody employed directly.
Standard — a part-time resident housekeeper alongside the external services: €45,000 to €80,000.
Full — resident housekeeper, a caretaker handling maintenance and contractors, seasonal chef, plus garden and pool teams: €90,000 to €180,000 and upward.
The legal part matters. Domestic staff in Spain fall under the Estatuto de los Trabajadores, must be registered with the Seguridad Social, and employer social security contributions add roughly a third on top of gross salary. Informal arrangements expose the owner to back-contributions and penalties, and they are the most common compliance failure among foreign owners on this coast.
For an owner who is here a few months a year, the alternative to staff is a management contract: check-ups, contractor coordination, seasonal opening and closing, typically €5,000 to €15,000 a year without employing anyone directly.
A worked example
A five-bedroom villa in a gated Marbella urbanisation, market value about €3M, mature garden of moderate size, 70 m² pool, owner in residence roughly four months a year, no resident staff, managed under contract.
IBI: €2,800. Non-resident imputed income tax: approximately €1,200. Community fee at €450 a month: €5,400. Electricity: €7,000. Water: €3,500. Pool service: €2,600. Garden team, twice weekly: €14,000. Insurance: €3,400. Management contract: €9,000. Cleaning between visits: €6,000.
Total: about €55,000 a year, before any capital reserve and before Patrimonio, which depends entirely on how the ownership is structured and where the owner is tax-resident.
Change one variable — put a resident caretaker in the guest house — and the same property costs €95,000 to €105,000. Change another — a large hillside garden with extensive irrigation — and water and grounds alone add €15,000.
This is why an honest answer to "what does it cost" begins with questions about the plot rather than the price.
How to use this before you buy
Two practical consequences.
First, ask for the actual invoices. IBI receipt, community fee statement, last twelve months of electricity and water, and the current garden and pool contracts. A seller who has them to hand is telling you something about how the house has been kept. These documents are part of the ordinary pre-purchase checks and should be requested at the offer stage, not at the notary.
Second, weigh the running cost against the plot before falling in love with the garden. On this coast the difference between a comfortable annual bill and an uncomfortable one is usually measured in square metres of irrigated planting, not in bedrooms.
If you want the arithmetic run against a specific residence rather than a category, describe what you are considering below — the shortlist comes back on this page, and we will put the running-cost estimate against whichever ones you want to look at.
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Frequently asked questions
How much does it cost to run a villa in Marbella per year?
A four-to-six bedroom villa in a gated urbanisation, used seasonally and without resident staff, typically runs €35,000 to €90,000 a year. With a resident housekeeper and caretaker the same house passes €150,000. The largest swing factors are garden size, whether anyone lives on site, and the community fee of the estate.
What is IBI and how much is it on a Marbella villa?
IBI is the annual municipal property tax, calculated on the cadastral value rather than the market value. On a villa worth €2M to €5M on the market, expect roughly €1,500 to €4,500 a year. It is the owner’s liability whether or not the property is let, and unpaid IBI transfers with the property.
Do non-residents pay tax on a Spanish holiday home that is not rented out?
Yes. Spanish law deems a property at your disposal to generate income: the base is 1.1% or 2% of the cadastral value depending on when it was last revised, taxed at 19% for EU, Icelandic and Norwegian residents and 24% for others. The amounts are modest but the annual filing is obligatory.
How much are community fees for a villa in Marbella?
Villa urbanisations typically charge €200 to €1,500 a month. The higher end reflects estates with round-the-clock manned security, private roads and their own infrastructure. A low fee on a large estate is often a sign of deferred maintenance that later arrives as a special assessment.