Member of the Spanish Association of Tax Advisors, it is part of the first collective investment entity of the RIC in the Islands that defends a hotel park in Canarian hands.
What is the legal figure of the Socimi?
They are listed corporations whose main activity is the acquisition, promotion and rehabilitation of real estate for lease. It is an investment vehicle in real estate assets that emerged in the early 1960s in the United States to channel the savings of individuals and institutional investors. The compulsory nature of the Socimi’s listing implies measures aimed at protecting the investor. In addition, they must compulsorily distribute at least 80% of the rental income, 100% of the dividends received from another Socimi and 50% of capital gains derived from the transfer of real estate and shares. This allows many small investors to invest in a joint, organized and transparent manner in hotel assets that they could not access individually.
How does it benefit Canarians and their tourism sector?
It is an alternative to materialize the RIC of many small businessmen and professionals, large Canarian investors and others who, even though they do not have the RIC, continue to choose to place part of their savings in the real estate sector. We are convinced that in this way, a large part of the hotel heritage of the Islands could remain in Canarian hands. So that everyone understands us, the Socimi is the closest thing in time, although larger and better organized, to what were the successful communities of owners of tourist establishments created in the 70s and 80s thanks to those small savers, attracted by the possibility of having a small apartment that they would rent on a monthly basis.
A system that declined with the crises and the new models of the sector.
After the financial crisis of 2008 and the birth of the Socimi in Spain, a change began in the traditional model of tourist exploitation in the Canary Islands, in which the hotel operator or manager was the owner of the property, towards the Anglo-Saxon model, in which the owner is one and the manager or operator is another. In this way, the ownership of large hotels passed into the hands of real estate investment funds and national and foreign Socimi.
If it continues like this, what would be the consequences?
If the hotels continue to pass into the hands of large companies from outside the Islands, the Canary Islands will be 40% poorer as the income from the hotel heritage leaves the Archipelago. It is more serious than we think, because we must not forget that covid-19 has hit us hard since 2020 and, when we all saw a certain light after the tunnel at the end of 2021, the sixth wave arrived that threw our expectations for the winter and, now, the war in Ukraine ends with the positive forecasts of the Canary Islands regarding the recovery of tourism for this year. All of this will have repercussions on the maintenance of the ownership of our hotels.
What do you propose to Canarian businessmen and professionals?
The collective investment of RIC is the best solution that we canaries have to protect our hotel heritage. The reorganization of hotel ownership around a Socimi will make the RIC become an important tax incentive that will favor access to ownership of properties leased by Canarian businessmen and professionals. At RIC Private Equity we propose to promote the creation of a large Socimi controlled by family-owned Canarian hotel companies, which can compete in its homeland with national and foreign Socimi, even offering these to be integrated into its structure. It is the union of hotel companies and Canarian investors to keep the hotel heritage in Canarian hands.
What do you demand from the Government of the Canary Islands?
That we focus on correcting the connection error with the reality that its predecessors had in 2006, the date up to which the RIC could materialize in the acquisition of real estate in general destined for leasing, with no other limitation than the exercise of the leasing activity was classified as business or organized and the absence of a link between the lessor and the lessee. The operator can never be the landlord of a hotel but the tenant of the same. Both the operator of the hotel asset and its owner who leases it to the hotel industry must be interpreted as a tourism company.
What would be needed immediately?
Legal certainty, certainty and stability through the executive, legislative and administrative powers. This is the opinion of Joaquín Latorre, head of PwC Tax & Legal, which I share singularly in relation to the leasing activity of hotel and non-hotel establishments, whose definition is unclear, requiring an immediate interpretative modification of the standard. A harmonious development of the legislation must be sought, accepting the leasing of the hotel industry as a valid economic activity for the purposes of the RIC. Without this legal certainty, it will be impossible to undertake the recovery of the tourism sector in the Canary Islands and even less to preserve the hotel heritage in Canarian hands.
