We all know that one of the expenses related to owning a car is the payment of the corresponding taxes. The circulation fee, also known as “the car fee”, is an annual fee that must be paid to the town hall where the vehicle is registered. And clearly it varies a lot depending on the location where you live. That has led to real tax havens exist which have lower taxes than most places and where quite striking situations occur.
As you will understand, it is not normal for there to be more than 37 cars per inhabitant and that is precisely what happens in Rozas de Puerto Real, a small municipality of Madrid. It is the most prominent case and it occupies the first position on the list as it has a tax that goes from 3.16 to 28 euros and 21,464 registered in 2023. They pay the established minimum amount, which is repeated in other municipalities such as Patones (Madrid), which has more than 20 registered cars per inhabitant. The podium is closed by Aguilar de Segarra, in Barcelona, which reaches 5,089 registered vehicles with only 294 inhabitants.
| Municipality | Registrations | Population | Cars/inhabitant |
| Rozas de Puerto Real (Madrid) | 21,464 cars | 578 inhabitants | 37.13 |
| Patones (Madrid) | 11,773 cars | 566 inhabitants | 20.8 |
| Aguilar de Segarra (Barcelona) | 5,089 cars | 294 inhabitants | 17.31 |
| Venturada (Madrid) | 36,428 cars | 2,554 inhabitants | 14.26 |
| Sarratella (Castellón) | 1,749 cars | 110 inhabitants | 13.45 |
| Escorca (Balearic Islands) | 2,104 cars | 194 inhabitants | 10.85 |
| Retascón (Zaragoza) | 765 cars | 71 inhabitants | 10.77 |
| La Hiruela (Madrid) | 732 cars | 74 inhabitants | 9.89 |
| Rajadell (Barcelona) | 4,202 cars | 571 inhabitants | 7.36 |
| Tejeda (Las Palmas) | 12,049 cars | 1,844 inhabitants | 6.53 |
A higher number of cars registered in 2023 occurred in Venturada, a Madrid municipality that reached 36,428 cars and that it is not higher on the list because its population is somewhat larger and that makes it stay in 14.26 cars per inhabitant. It is striking that most of these motor tax havens are small towns that do not reach 1,000 inhabitants and that is why they traditionally offered this favorable taxation. Although now they are taking too much advantage of those taxes.
The truth is that the differences can reach up to 900% between locations and that is vital for companies that have large fleets. Many do not hesitate to register in some of these tax havens to reduce their economic impact, despite the fact that these vehicles never even circulate in these municipalities. It is striking that in ten municipalities (with a population of between 600 and 15,000 inhabitants) almost 40% of cars were registered of the business channel. No less than 208,125 units out of a national total of 528,762 vehicles.
