Method
The Index has two layers. Layer A is the tax a household pays, which the region sets. Layer B is how a town scores for daily life. They are built separately, and stay separate.
Layer A · recurring tax
The Tertulia Engine calculates the three taxes a resident pays every year in Spain: income tax (IRPF), wealth tax (Patrimonio) and the solidarity tax on large fortunes (ITSGF), for the 2026 tax year in each of the 15 common-regime regions. It works as a US retiree's tax adviser would: Spanish tax residence for the full year, US Social Security and retirement-account income, and the credit Spain gives for US tax under the treaty. Every rule and rate comes from a primary source: Spanish law as consolidated in the BOE, each region's 2026 measures, the tax agency's guidance and the US–Spain treaty.
Figures for your own household are estimated from engine runs for a wide range of households. Couples are treated as two individual returns. The solidarity tax is reduced by any wealth tax paid to the region, so in regions that collect their own wealth tax it appears under Patrimonio.
Property tax (IBI) is added town by town, from each municipality's 2025 rate published by the Ministry of Finance and an estimated assessed value of your home. The estimate errs on the high side.
Engine v4.1 passes 168 of 168 validation tests and has been checked against the tax agency's own simulators.
Not in this Index
Navarra and the Basque Country (Araba, Bizkaia, Gipuzkoa) collect their own taxes under the foral regime. The engine models the common regime only, so these territories are shown in grey rather than approximated. Ceuta and Melilla are also excluded. Nor does Layer A include the transfer tax on buying a home (ITP), inheritance and gift tax, or regional income-tax deductions.
Layer B · liveability
Layer B scores 252 Spanish municipalities with more than 25,000 inhabitants on ten dimensions of daily life. Each measure is compared across the 252 and scaled from 0 to 100, and the dimensions are combined with the default weights below. On the Index page you can set your own. Towns with many second homes are marked seasonal, because per-resident figures overstate what they offer year-round.
| Healthcare | 22% |
| Safety | 14% |
| Connectivity | 13% |
| Climate | 12% |
| Integration | 11% |
| Lifestyle | 10% |
| Aging & care | 8% |
| Cost of living | 5% |
| Housing | 4% |
| Governance | 1% |
Healthcare
Public and private hospitals within reach of the town, the beds they offer, and access to hospitals with an international patient service. Private care counts for a large part, because a new resident on a non-lucrative visa must hold private insurance.
Safety
Home burglaries, violent crime and road accidents. Violent crime is measured against everyone present, visitors included, so resorts are not penalised for their tourists.
Connectivity
How long it takes to get from the town to a flight to the United States, including the connection when there is no direct departure.
Climate
Heat, sunshine, rain and frost, from the official climate records of Spain's weather agency.
Integration
How international the town already is, overall and among people of retirement age, and how many residents come from the UK, western Europe or North America, from the 2025 census.
Lifestyle
Restaurants, cafés and bars, and theatres, cinemas and museums, relative to the population.
Aging & care
Places in private care homes nearby and the distance to the nearest one, with long-stay care hospitals. Spain’s public dependency-care system is left out: it requires five years of legal residence, so a newcomer cannot use it. Where a region does not register long-stay hospitals nationally, its towns are scored on the private care homes.
Cost of living
Groceries, from the OCU 2026 supermarket survey in the towns OCU covers, and the private health insurance a non-lucrative visa requires. Spain publishes no local price index, so this dimension is deliberately narrow.Cost of living: pending publication permission.
Housing
What a home costs to buy, and whether the town is lived in all year rather than mostly by second-home owners.
Governance
The town hall's debt per resident.
Data gaps
Some measures are not yet in Layer B, because no reliable source covers all the towns:
- Local water and waste charges, and fuel prices.
- Groceries outside the towns in OCU's survey, where Cost of living is left unscored rather than guessed.
- Hospital waiting times.
- Rents and the pace of home sales.
- Private home-care services, and what a place in a private care home costs town by town.
- Travel times by road: distances are measured in a straight line for now.
- Commuters, in the count of people present that Safety uses.
- US residents on their own: Spain publishes them for only half the towns, so Integration counts North America (the US, Canada and Mexico) together.
Where a town lacks a measure, it is scored on what is available, never given a zero.
Which towns are in the Index
Spain has 306 municipalities with more than 25,000 inhabitants. The Index covers 252 of them. It leaves out 54 commuter suburbs: towns in the metropolitan area of a larger city rather than its centre, with a below-median share of residents holding a university degree and few residents from the UK, western Europe or North America. They are mostly the industrial towns around Barcelona, Madrid and Valencia. Cities that share an urban area as equals, such as Elche or Reus, and resort towns are always included.
Why the layers stay apart
Tax is a euro amount set by the region; liveability is a score that belongs to the town. Blending them into one number would hide which one is driving a ranking. The survey combines them only for you, with the balance you choose.
Sources
Every figure traces to a published source. The full list, with a link to each one, is on the Sources page.
Changelog
- Oct 2026 Engine v4.1. Default weights set for an affluent American couple over 60: more weight on healthcare, climate and Aging & care, less on cost of living and housing. Integration updated to the 2025 census and now counts residents from the UK, western Europe and North America. Aging & care now measures private care homes instead of the public dependency-care system. 54 commuter suburbs left out: the Index now covers 252 towns. Cost of living published with OCU's permission. Income tax corrected for low incomes.
- Sept 2026 Property tax (IBI) added for every town. Private care made a central part of Healthcare; health insurance added to Cost of living; Aging & care no longer zero where long-stay hospitals are not registered; flight data checked.
- Earlier Safety rebuilt around burglary and violent crime; supermarket prices replace local incomes; Lifestyle from OpenStreetMap; Aging & care, Connectivity and hospital catchments added.