Bars for sale in Spain: what to check before you buy one

A bar on the Spanish coast is the business most British buyers have in mind when they start looking. It is also the one where the advert tells you least. This page is about bars specifically: what they cost, where they are, the licences that decide what you can do, and how to find out whether the till matches the story.

How a sale works in general (traspaso or company, taxes, debts, staff, NIE) is covered in our guide to buying a business in Spain.

Bars for sale in Spain: what 154 listings ask

We read every Spanish bar listed on businessesforsale.com, one of the biggest English-language portals, on 29 September 2026. There were 154.

Two things stand out. The first is how cheap the entry point looks: a quarter of the leasehold bars ask less than €50,000. That buys the right to trade in someone else's building for as long as the lease lasts, so the price means little until you have read the lease. The second is how little the adverts prove. Only 13 give a turnover and 6 a net profit. The rest ask you to take the seller's word for it.

Bar for sale on the Costa del Sol, Costa Blanca or the islands: where they are

The English-language market is small and concentrated. Spain has more than 163,000 bars. Two provinces, Málaga and Alicante, carry two thirds of the ones advertised to British buyers.

If you want a bar for sale on the Costa del Sol, you are in the busiest part of this market. Fuengirola alone had 27 of the 64, followed by Benalmádena with 16 and Torremolinos with 8. On the Costa Blanca the listings spread between the north (Calpe, Moraira, Jávea) and the area around Torrevieja and San Miguel de Salinas. In Tenerife most are in the south, around Los Cristianos and Las Américas. In each of these places, you compete with other foreign buyers and asking prices are set with them in mind.

Catalonia shows the other side. It has almost 24,000 bars and three of them were on the English portal. Bars in areas without many foreign residents change hands through Spanish portals, local agents and word of mouth. You need Spanish to find them, and to run them.

Leasehold, freehold and premium free: reading the advert

• Leasehold almost always means a traspaso. You pay the outgoing owner for the lease rights, the fit-out and the trade, and then pay rent. Of the 154 bars, 110 were sold this way.
• Freehold means the premises are included. You buy property as well as a business, with transfer tax on the property at the regional rate. 31 of the 154.
• Premium free means there is no traspaso fee: you take the premises on a new lease and pay only rent, deposit and whatever the fittings cost. Often the cheapest start, sometimes because the last owner could not make it work.

Whatever the label, ask for the lease itself. How many years it has left, whether it can be assigned and what the rent rises to are worth more than the photos.

Licences: activity, terrace, music and hours

The activity licence belongs to the premises and the type of business, and it is issued by the town hall. It says what kind of venue the place is. A café-bar without music, a bar with music and a restaurant with a kitchen are different categories with different conditions. It also sets a maximum capacity. Check three things: that the licence exists, that it is in the seller's name, and that it covers what the bar does in practice. A bar that plays music at night on a licence for a quiet café is one complaint from a neighbour away from a fine or a closure order, and that problem is yours after the sale.

The terrace permit is separate. Town halls grant it per season or per year, set the number of tables and often make it personal to the holder. On the coast, the terrace can be half the takings. Ask for the current permit and the plan showing the tables, and do not pay for tables that are not on it.

Opening hours depend on the venue category under the regional rules and on local bylaws. A bar licensed to close at 2 in the morning cannot trade as a late bar, however the last owner ran it.

Changing the licence to your name is a filing at the town hall, with a fee that varies by town. The town hall can inspect before accepting it, so anything that does not match the licence tends to surface at that moment.

Restaurant for sale in Spain: the kitchen checks

A restaurant, or a bar that serves hot food, adds a layer of checks. The licence must allow a kitchen. A bar licensed without one cannot start serving cooked meals just because the equipment is there. The kitchen needs smoke extraction that meets the local rules, often a flue up to the roof, and in many buildings the community of owners has to allow it. Gas installations need their certificates, and the fire safety measures depend on the size and capacity.

Ask the seller for the licence and the latest inspection reports, and have someone qualified look at the extraction before you agree a price. Putting in a new flue in an old building can cost more than the traspaso, and sometimes it cannot be done at all.

The season on the coast

Coastal bars earn most of the year's money in a few months. August takings mean little without February's. Ask for monthly figures for a full year, not an annual total, and work out whether the quiet months cover the rent and the wages. A bar in a town with year-round residents is a different business from a seafront bar that serves holidaymakers, even if both look busy in summer.

The staff come with the bar, with their seniority, under Spanish law. Seasonal workers on fixed-discontinuous contracts come back each season, and that commitment passes to you too. How staff transfer is explained in the general guide.

How to check a bar's takings

Many small bars run by self-employed owners pay tax under módulos, and in 2026 bars still can. The tax is worked out from the number of staff, the contracted electrical power, the tables, the length of the bar and any gaming machines. Sales do not come into it. So the tax returns of a bar on módulos prove nothing about what it takes. Here is what does help:

• Card terminal statements from the bank for twelve months. On the coast a large part of the takings goes through the card machine. A statement you download yourself with the seller, or get from the bank directly, is hard to fake.
• Supplier invoices. A 30-litre keg is about 150 small beers of 20 cl. A kilo of coffee is roughly 140 espressos at 7 grams each. If the seller claims 300 coffees a day and buys 8 kilos a month, something does not add up.
• Sit in the bar. Different days, different hours, out of season as well. Count customers and look at what they order.
• A handover period. Two weeks working next to the owner before completion, with the price conditional on what you see, is a reasonable thing to ask for.

Source: Order HAC/1425/2025, módulos for 2026, heading 673.2 (cafés and bars). BOE, 11 December 2025. Keg and coffee conversions are our own rough arithmetic.

If the bar is not on módulos, ask for the VAT and income tax returns as well. The list is in the general guide under checking the turnover.

Brewery and coffee contracts

Many bars have a supply agreement with a brewery or a coffee brand: exclusive supply for a number of years, in exchange for equipment on loan, a discount or cash up front. The taps, the fridges and the coffee machine may not be the seller's to sell. Ask for every supply contract, check whether it passes to you, and find out what you owe if you want to change supplier.

NIE and residence

You need an NIE to sign, and if you are not an EU citizen you need a residence permit that lets you work before you run the bar yourself. What each step involves is in the general guide: NIE, residence and registering the business.