Malaga takes second place in Spain where the price of flat sharing has risen the most

Malaga is the second-placed city in Spain where the price of shared housing has risen the most, new data shows. As of December 2024, renting a room in Malaga city costs an average of 517 euros, a 23.6% increase compared to 12 months earlier when the average price was less than 420 euros, according to data from real estate portal Fotocasa.

Only the Valencian municipality of Burjassot, where the year-on-year increase is 36.2%, up to 500 euros, surpasses Malaga city. According to the data, Seville is the third city in Spain with the highest increase in the past 12 months where the price of renting a room went up 22.8% to 453 euros.

The demand of these two Andalusian cities helps to explain why this region has seen the highest increase in the price of flat sharing in the whole country: the rise was 21%, to 391 euros per month, compared to 323 euros a year earlier. Although Andalucía is below the Spanish average, where the average rental price of a room is 520 euros per month, compared to 466 euros 12 months ago.

María Matos, spokesperson for Fotocasa, pointed out that the price of a room in a shared flat in Spain exceeds 500 euros, on average, for the first time in history. "This means that tenants have never had to face such a high cost as now," Matos said. "In Spain as a whole, the increase in the rent of a whole house has been higher (14%) than that of a room (11%), due to the fact that the supply of rooms has increased significantly," she added. However, the highest prices correspond to the most in demand cities and that more tenants are forced to flat share to reduce their spending on rent, Matos pointed out.

The most expensive region in Spain for flat sharing is Catalonia, costing an average 636 euros per month, followed by Madrid (586 euros), and then Balearic Islands and the Basque Country (around 575 euros, on average). The cheapest are Extremadura (242 euros per month) and Castilla-La Mancha (265 euros). They are the only two where the average is less than 300 euros, the data shows.

Malaga, at an average of 517 euros per room, is the most expensive city in Andalucía, followed by Cadiz (482 euros), which is ahead of Seville (453 euros). The cheapest is Huelva (264 euros per month, on average). Sharing a flat is also less than 300 euros per month in Córdoba and Jaén, as well as in the Cadiz municipality of Jerez de la Frontera.

Nationally, the most expensive room rents are in Barcelona (661 euros per month), Bilbao (627 euros), Palma de Mallorca (592 euros) and Madrid (518 euros).