Guadix sets the threshold for any habitable room at four square meters

The Guadix City Council has set the threshold at 4.00 square meters, above which any room integrated into a dwelling is considered susceptible to habitable use. This is established through interpretive criterion No. 15 to the PGOU-2002, approved by the Plenary in the session of September 29, 2026, and published in the Official Gazette of the Province of Granada No. 206, dated Friday, October 23, 2026, with official reference BOP-GRA-2026-206008.

Lighting and Ventilation Conditions

The criterion is issued for the purposes of applying article 30.9.3 of the Ordinances of the General Urban Development Plan of Guadix, with the stated aim of guaranteeing adequate habitability conditions and preventing the creation of substandard housing situations.

According to the plenary agreement, any room or dependency integrated into a dwelling with a useful surface area equal to or greater than 4.00 m² will be considered, for the exclusive purposes of applying habitability conditions, as a room susceptible to habitable use. Consequently, it must have the corresponding lighting and ventilation conditions required by the PGOU and the applicable sectoral regulations, regardless of the designation assigned to it in the technical project.

Storage Rooms and Walk-in Closets Do Not Evade the Regulation

The document specifies that compliance with these conditions cannot be excluded simply by identifying the room with certain names. The following dependencies are expressly affected:

• storage room
• pantry
• walk-in closet
• warehouse/store
• auxiliary room
• any analogous designation

All of these will be subject to the criterion when they reach or exceed the indicated useful surface area.

The agreement does exclude spaces whose configuration, dimensions, and function are unequivocally incompatible with the use of a room or habitual stay. The official enumeration includes:

• toilets/powder rooms
• utility/installation rooms
• distributors
• hallways
• other spaces of an analogous nature

This exclusion is established without prejudice to the fulfillment of the specific conditions that may be required for them.

Control in Licenses and Changes of Use

The criterion will be applied to files in which it is appropriate to assess the habitability conditions of dwellings. In particular, it affects applications for licenses, responsible declarations, or enabling titles involving a change of use to residential, renovation, or redistribution of a dwelling.

In those procedures, the Municipal Technical Services will verify compliance based on the material and functional configuration of each room and not exclusively on the designation reflected in the technical documentation. The plenary agreement further orders the publication of this criterion in the BOP of Granada, on the notice board, and on the Transparency Portal of the Electronic Office of the Guadix City Council.

The text appears signed by the Mayor-President, Jesús Rafael Lorente Fernández, in Guadix on October 16, 2026, with registration number 2026055745.

Impact for owners and developers

The decision has a direct effect on any intervention in housing within the municipality: interior redistributions, comprehensive renovations, and changes of use must justify lighting and ventilation in all rooms of 4 m² or more, regardless of the name appearing in the project. The criterion closes the possibility of counting rooms that, by surface area, are materially habitable as mere storage rooms, and reinforces the municipal control capacity against substandard housing in a residential stock with abundant traditional housing and caves.

Source: Official Gazette of the Province of Granada, no. 206, October 23, 2026, Local Administration — Urban Planning, page 22 (official reference: BOP-GRA-2026-206008).