Pollensa has historically been associated with holiday rental accommodation. | Archive

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The latest data from the National Institute of Statistics (INE) indicate that there are 2,811 registered holiday rental properties in Pollensa, the highest number for a municipality in Mallorca. Historically associated with this type of accommodation, the registered properties equate to 23% of all dwellings in Pollensa. The number of accommodation places well exceeds that of hotels (7,000), a peculiarity for a holiday municipality. Neighbouring Alcudia has the second highest number of registered properties - 1,872 (16.1% of the total) - but Alcudia has almost four times as many hotel places as Pollensa.

Miquel Cifre, president of the Mallorca Villas association, says that the high percentage of holiday rental properties in Pollensa does not increase problems with finding residential accommodation. This is because many are villas which, because of their high price, are outside the normal residential market.

Pollensa's tourism councillor, María Buades, agrees. The high percentage doesn't "in principle" make it difficult to access residential accommodation because most of it is located outside urban centres. She adds that "the fact that the urban centre of Pollensa has been declared a mature area means that tourist places cannot be authorised".

This said, the perspective can differ according to political colour. Buades is a councillor with an administration of the right and centre-right. The previous administration was of the left. Former mayor Miquel Àngel March once spoke about his concerns about a boom in holiday apartments in Puerto Pollensa and the degree to which these were forcing people to look elsewhere for residential accommodation. While the percentage of holiday properties for the whole municipality is just under a quarter, it has been shown that it is as much as 40% in Puerto Pollensa.

The INE data show that Búger, with 190 registered holiday rental properties, has the highest percentage in Mallorca - 26.9% of all dwellings. Ariany with 128 is second with 25.1%. Pollensa is third. Palma has 1,390 properties, just 0.8% of the total, but then Palma has a ban on holiday apartments. Santanyi with 1,201 is the only other municipality in four figures. Calvia, which may seem surprising, has only 570 registered properties.