Becoming self-employed in Spain when you are not Spanish

First of all: being allowed to work here

Everything starts with your foreigner's identity number. For the tax agency, a foreign individual's tax number is, as a rule, their NIE, and without it no registration is possible. If you live in Spain, it is on your TIE or on your EU citizen registration certificate.

The second question depends on your passport. If you are a citizen of the European Union, the European Economic Area or Switzerland, you may work for yourself on the same terms as a Spaniard; what you owe, if you stay longer than three months, is registration in the central foreigners' register. If you are not European, you need an authorisation that lets you work on your own account: either you already hold one (some residence permits allow it), or you must apply for a residence and self-employment authorisation, which requires a project, a sufficient investment and the qualifications for the activity. That file goes through the consulate or the foreigners' office, and it is worth checking your exact case with them before any other step.

Registering with the tax agency: modelo 036, and only 036

The first registration is the census one: you tell the Agencia Tributaria that you are starting an activity, what it is, where you carry it out and which VAT and income tax regimes apply. It is done on the modelo 036, and it must be filed before you invoice, receive or make payments, or hire anyone.

If you have read on a forum that there is a "simplified" modelo 037, that advice is out of date. Orden HAC/1526/2024 abolished the modelo 037 with effect from 3 February 2025, and since then every registration, change and deregistration goes through the 036, which now carries the filling-in aids. The 036 is also where you choose the activity heading: a choice that later decides which taxes apply to you, and one worth making with someone who knows the difference.

Registering with Social Security: the RETA

The second registration is in the special scheme for self-employed workers, the RETA. According to the Social Security guide to self-employment, you must notify it on the day you start working for yourself, or up to 60 days before. If you register late, it takes effect from the first day of that month and you pay the whole month.

Since 2023, under Real Decreto-ley 13/2022, the self-employed contribute on their real net income. When you register you declare your expected average monthly earnings and choose a contribution base within the annual table set by law. If your forecast changes, you can switch base up to six times a year. Once the year closes, Social Security matches your base against the income the tax agency reports and regularises: it refunds what you overpaid or claims what was missing. That is why this page gives no monthly figure: it depends on what you will earn, and it is corrected a year later.

The reduced rate at the start

People registering for the first time, or who have not been registered in the preceding years set by the rules, can ask for a reduced contribution. According to the Social Security guide consulted on 1 October 2026, it is 80 euros a month for the first 12 months, plus the intergenerational equity surcharge, and it can be extended for another 12 months if your expected net income stays below the national minimum wage.

Two warnings. It is not applied automatically: you request it when you file the registration, and whoever leaves the box unticked loses it. And it is subject to regularisation like everything else, so read the conditions carefully before relying on it.

The calendar: every quarter and every January

Being autónomo is above all a calendar. Each quarter you file the modelo 303, the VAT return for the VAT charged on your invoices minus the VAT paid on your expenses. And, unless an exception applies, the modelo 130, the income tax prepayment if you are under direct assessment. The first three quarters are filed from 1 to 20 April, July and October; the fourth from 1 to 30 January of the following year. If the last day is not a working day, the deadline moves to the next working day.

The 130 exception matters to many professionals: they are not obliged to file it if, in the previous year, at least 70% of their activity income was subject to withholding, according to the tax agency's handbook on economic activities. In January you also file the modelo 390, the annual VAT summary, and during the income tax campaign your annual IRPF return covers the whole activity. If you have staff or pay other professionals, withholding returns and their annual summaries come on top.

Invoicing correctly from the first invoice

Invoices follow the invoicing regulation approved by Real Decreto 1619/2012. A full invoice carries a consecutive number and series, the date, the name and address of the issuer and of the customer, your tax number, a description of what you sell, the taxable base, the VAT rate applied and the VAT amount. If the transaction is exempt, the invoice says why.

The simplified invoice, the old till receipt, is only allowed in listed cases: when the amount does not exceed 400 euros including VAT, among the other cases in article 4 of the same regulation. Invoices issued and received are kept for the period set by the General Tax Law. Gaps in the numbering and invoices without the customer's tax number are the two mistakes that raise the most questions in a tax check.

Why almost every foreigner hires an adviser

Keeping the books of an autónomo is not hard, but it never stops: recording every invoice issued and received, separating what is deductible from what is not, preparing four 303s and four 130s a year, the 390, the income tax return, watching the contribution base and answering letters. All in Spanish, on online portals that ask for Cl@ve or a digital certificate.

That is why most people who arrive from abroad pay a monthly fee to an adviser who keeps the accounts and files the returns. What the adviser cannot do for you is keep your receipts, ask for invoices with your tax number and tell them when something changes: the arrangement works if you hand over the papers on time.

What this guide cannot tell you

How much you will contribute, because it depends on what you earn. Which activity heading and which VAT regime fit you, because it depends on exactly what you do. Whether your current residence permit lets you work for yourself, because it depends on a document we have not seen. And whether a company would suit you better, which is another guide.

What we do: HolaOwners gathers your papers, translates them and follows each step with you, and our partner tax adviser handles the registrations, the returns and the bookkeeping.

Frequently asked questions

Services

The other guides

Official sources

• Spanish Tax Agency · Modelo 036, census declaration
• Spanish Official Gazette · Orden HAC/1526/2024, abolishing the modelo 037
• Spanish Tax Agency · Registration and tax number request
• Spanish Official Gazette · Real Decreto-ley 13/2022, new self-employed contribution system
• Spanish Social Security · Practical guide to self-employment
• Spanish Tax Agency · Filing deadlines for the modelo 303
• Spanish Tax Agency · Income tax prepayments (modelo 130)
• Spanish Tax Agency · 2026 taxpayer calendar, until 30 January
• Spanish Official Gazette · Real Decreto 1619/2012, invoicing regulation