Tourism Residential Accommodation Policy Tabled

Greek tourism will soon see new arrangements that include the establishment of the long awaited tourism residential accommodation, according to the Finance Ministry’s omnibus bill tabled in Parliament last month aimed to tackle Greece’s financial crisis.

The omnibus bill establishes the framework of tourism investments with special requirements for tourism residential accommodation designed to attract high quality investment.

Internationally, tourism residential accommodation is a separate, furnished unit, within a hotel complex in which the owner coexists within the overall area of the hotel complex that includes similar furnished units of the complex, leased on the usual daily basis by the management of the tourism business in question.

In a press briefing last month, Culture and Tourism Minister Pavlos Geroulanos said the tourism residential accommodation measure would be implemented exclusively in five-star hotels.

The minister told journalists that an interest to invest in tourism residential accommodation had already been expressed by Russia and Israel.

According to the bill, Greece’s tourism residential accommodation will be in the form of “mixed use resorts” and built on land over 150 stremma and located in areas of integrated tourism development.

During a recent conference, the president of the Association of Greek Tourism Enterprises, Andreas Andreadis, said the tourism residential accommodation would lead to annual investments in Greece of two billion euros.