How much deposit is normal for a contrato de arras?

Indicative reference points for the range seen in the Spanish market. These are not rules: they are the starting point people negotiate from.

The 10% comes from no statute. It has settled because it balances the two risks in the transaction: high enough that the seller does not profit by accepting a better offer and repaying you double, and not so high that the buyer has a disproportionate amount of capital tied up and at risk for months.

The range seen in practice runs from 5% to 15%. Below 5% the deposit stops performing its deterrent function; above 15% the buyer takes on exposure that is hard to justify, particularly if the financing is not yet secured.

One piece of arithmetic is worth keeping in mind when a mortgage is involved: the deposit comes entirely out of your savings, not out of the loan. Added to the down payment and the purchase costs, a large deposit can leave you short of liquidity exactly when you need it.

If you are the buyer and you fear the seller will receive a better offer, a high deposit suits you: it makes backing out expensive for them. If your concern is financing or exposure, a low one suits you, because it caps what you can lose.

If you are the seller the logic inverts. A high deposit secures a committed buyer and filters out the ones who are merely testing the water; a low one leaves you room to withdraw cheaply if something better appears, but it also signals to the buyer that you are not very committed.

All of this only works with arras penitenciales, which are the ones that allow withdrawal in exchange for forfeiting or doubling the deposit. With arras confirmatorias the amount buys no exit at all, so raising it increases what you risk without giving you any right in return.

Transactions often begin with a small reservation — two or three thousand euros — on signing a purchase proposal through the agency, with the balance up to the agreed percentage handed over days later on signing the arras contract proper.

That first payment deserves attention, because it is frequently the worst documented part of the whole process. Check three things: that the document says what happens to the money if the transaction does not proceed, who holds it in the meantime, and that the amount will be deducted from the final price rather than being an agency commission.

A reservation signed without those three points can turn into money you do not get back and that is not deducted from anything — and it is too small an amount for a claim to be worth pursuing.

The deposit is a payment on account of the price. On the day of the deed it is deducted from the total, so it is not an extra cost of buying: it is part of the price paid early.

Do not confuse the deposit with the costs of the sale, which are separate. The Civil Code default is that the costs of executing the deed fall on the seller, and those of the first copy and anything after the sale on the buyer, unless otherwise agreed.

"Unless otherwise agreed" is the important part: it almost always is agreed, and not always in your favour. It is worth having the arras contract already state how notary, land registry and tax are split, because at that stage it is still negotiable and on the day of signing before the notary it is not.

By bank transfer, always. It leaves a record of who paid, how much, when and to whom, and that record is exactly what you would need if you ever have to make a claim. Cash offers a buyer no advantage in a property transaction.

Check that the recipient of the transfer is the seller named in the contract, or an account expressly identified in it. Paying the deposit into the account of the agency without the contract providing for it puts an unnecessary intermediary between your money and your right to get it back.

And keep the transfer receipt with the signed contract. They are two documents that cost nothing to keep today and are hard to reconstruct if things go wrong months from now.