Portugal's government cites an AIMA caseload of 30,000; immigrants have filed 124,000 lawsuits it does not count, and the Council of Ministers has now approved specialised immigration courts. Navarra gazetted the seasonal-rental rule Spain's national decree failed to deliver. We also correct our 18 July reading of Mexico City's short-let registry.
Across this fortnight's jurisdictions, the published number measures the instrument, not the outcome it claims to track.
Portugal puts its migration queue at 30,000 files. Immigrants have filed 124,000 lawsuits over the ones nobody processed, and the cabinet has now approved specialised immigration courts.
Portugal's Council of Ministers approved diplomas on 23 July creating specialised immigration and asylum courts and ending Lisbon's exclusive hold on lawsuits against its migration agency. The agency faces 124,000 suits, with just 34% of 152,000 pending cases resolved so far.
A 28-judge task force cleared 22,436 suits between April and June. Spreading cases beyond Lisbon tests whether the new courts can match that pace once the reform takes effect.
Navarra's room-rental law reached Spain's state gazette on 28 July, the same day the national housing decree-law was due at cabinet and instead slipped to September.
Navarra's Parliament passed Ley Foral 11/2026 on 2 July, publishing it in Spain's official gazette on 28 July, with three room-rental categories and a 12-month auto-conversion rule. Spain's national housing decree, due the same day, was postponed to September after Podemos withheld its votes.
Navarra's law rests on centuries-old foral civil-law competence, predating the May ruling that opened short-let registration to all 17 regions. Only five other historic communities could copy it; Madrid and Valencia cannot.
Acento Noticias reports that the city prosecutor's despojo unit is examining rings that seize occupied homes and run them as short lets. We also correct our 18 July reading of the registry.
Mexico City's Fiscalía despojo unit is investigating rings that seize occupied housing and list it on short-let sites before selling to developers. Acento Noticias reported the investigation on 27 July, pending official confirmation.
Fewer than 5% of roughly 27,000 estimated active short-lets have completed registration, host collective Todos Somos Anfitriones says. No platform has been shown to know which listings involved seized properties.
Caucasian Knot reports that Iman Asgari, an Iranian holding a Georgian residence permit, is held in a Tbilisi detention centre after his embassy declined to renew his passport.
Caucasian Knot reported on 25 July that Iman Asgari, an Iranian national in Georgia, is detained in Tbilisi after Iran's embassy declined to renew his passport.
The outlet ties the refusal to Asgari's part in Tbilisi's anti-government protests, a claim Lowdown has not independently confirmed. Caucasian Knot's report names only Iran's embassy as responsible, not any Georgian authority.
INE's June hotel survey shows 38.6 million overnight stays, down 0.9 per cent, while the average daily rate per occupied room climbed 5.8 per cent to EUR 137.1.
Spain's national statistics agency published June hotel figures on 24 July: 38.6 million overnight stays, down 0.9% year on year, with occupancy at 65.6%, down 0.2 points. The average daily rate rose 5.8% to 137.1 euros.
Hotels are filling a similar share of rooms at higher prices even as registered short-term rental inventory fell 12.4%. Madrid rents kept climbing too, up 7.6% to 23.7 euros per square metre.
STEK's president told Alpha TV that Cypriot short-let occupancy and prices are both down 10 to 15 per cent, three days after STEK asked the government to cap the sector.
CyprusKonstantinos Karakontis, president of Cyprus's Self-Service Tourist Accommodation Association, told Alpha TV on 18 July that short-let occupancy and prices each fell 10 to 15 per cent year on year. Three days earlier a separate body, the Association of Cyprus Tourist Enterprises, representing licensed hotels, asked government for an annual cap, inspections, fines and an overnight levy. Cypriot press calls both bodies STEK. Licensing data shows 8,500 licensed properties against 12,000 to 15,000 advertised.
Tomislav Coric finalised Croatia's flat-rate tourist-rental tax on 27 July: EUR 150 per bed a year in the most developed tourist municipalities, EUR 100 in the rest.
Croatia's Deputy Prime Minister Tomislav Coric finalised a flat per-bed tourist-rental tax on 27 July. Rates run 100 to 150 euros in the busiest municipalities and 70 to 100 euros elsewhere, from 1 January 2027.
The state expects roughly 60 million euros in extra revenue once public consultation ends. Coric softened a harsher May proposal after landlord associations pushed back against it.
Bali's tourism chief reported 3.7 million foreign arrivals to 23 July and PWA levy receipts of Rp208 billion to 26 July, without putting a compliance percentage on the pair.
Bali logged 3.7 million foreign arrivals by 23 July and Rp208 billion in foreign-visitor levy receipts by 26 July, provincial tourism chief I Wayan Sumarajaya reported. Indonesia's ombudsman has flagged the gap as a governance problem.
Sumarajaya's own figures show compliance at 32% in 2024 and 36% for January to October 2025, the only confirmed rates on record. No 2026 compliance figure has yet been published.
ELSTAT's final 2025 accounts put 49.3 per cent of Greece's overnight stays in the South Aegean and Crete, where none of the country's short-let restrictions reach.
Greece's statistics agency published final 2025 tourism figures on 27 July: 38.2 million arrivals, up 2.8%, and 156.3 million overnight stays, up 2.2%. The South Aegean and Crete alone took 49.3% of all overnight stays.
Greece's short-let restrictions apply only in Athens and Thessaloniki, cities that host roughly a quarter of arrivals between them. The islands carrying half the country's tourist nights face no comparable registration limits.
Direction: sideways. The tipping mechanism is Spain's Council of Ministers returning the national housing decree in September 2026: if Podemos supplies the five votes it currently withholds, a national seasonal-contract cap goes live and Navarra's Ley Foral 11/2026 becomes precedent rather than exception; if not, the other five foral communities, Aragón, the Balearic Islands, Catalonia, Galicia and the Basque Country, gain fresh reason to legislate their own version before Madrid does.
