The Directorate General for Legal Certainty and Public Faith has ruled on an appeal against a Valencia registrar's refusal to register a change of use from commercial premises to a tourist apartment. The ruling establishes that, in the Valencian Community, the tourist process begins with the application for urban planning compatibility rather than the regional licence (Articles 64 to 66 of Law 15/2018). Therefore, if the procedure was initiated before restrictive regulatory changes, the previous regulations must apply based on the principles of legal certainty and legitimate expectation (Art. 3.1 Law 40/2015).
For owners of commercial premises seeking to convert them into tourist accommodation, the ruling protects the continuity of procedures already initiated with the administration. This prevents delays beyond the applicant's control (such as delays in municipal resolutions) from forcing compliance with new, more restrictive legal requirements. In the Valencian Community, this means that the application for urban planning compatibility marks the start of the process for the purposes of applying regulations (Law 15/2018).
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