Definitions

Three numbers, and the caveats that decide whether your conclusion holds.

Rent — € per m² per month

The average contractual rent per square metre, computed from rental deposits registered with INCASÒL. Catalan law requires the deposit on a residential lease to be lodged with them, which is why the figure exists at all.

It is what people signed, not what anyone asked. Listing portals measure a different thing — asking prices, weighted towards whatever has not let yet — and the two do not reconcile.

Sale price — € per m² of built area

The average transaction price per square metre of built area, from sales registered with the Catalan property registries. Closed transactions again, not asking prices.

Built area includes the share of common parts, so it is larger than the floor you walk on. A price per usable metre would be roughly a tenth higher.

Gross rental yield — %

A year of rent as a percentage of the purchase price for the same area and quarter: rent × 12 ÷ sale price × 100.

Gross means before IBI, community fees, insurance, maintenance, vacancy and tax. Net yield is typically one to two points lower. And a high yield marks a cheap purchase market rather than a good one — Ciutat Meridiana yields well because nobody wants to buy there.

Three things that catch people out

The city figure is not the mean of the districts. The Generalitat publishes a Barcelona row computed over all contracts, including the ones they could not place on a map. Averaging the ten districts gives a different, wrong number. Use cityRent.

A quarter is a quarter of registrations, not of activity. A lease signed in March may register in April. Quarter-on-quarter moves of a percent or two are mostly this.

2020 and 2021 are not usable as normal years. Both series took the same lockdown shock, which manufactures correlations between anything measured across it. Any relationship you find on this data should be re-run with those two years dropped before you believe it.