Swim spa or pool in Mallorca: cost, time, licences and winter use

Most people who ask us about a swim spa have already priced a pool. They have a quote, a licence timeline, and a plot that is not quite big enough. This guide compares the two with Mallorca numbers and ends with the cases where a pool is still the right answer.

Cost to build

An in-ground pool in Mallorca is a construction project. For an 8×4 m reinforced concrete pool with a liner or tiled finish, filtration, a pump room and a basic surround, quotes on the island typically start around €40,000 and climb quickly with terrain, access and finish. A rocky plot in Pollença or a slope in Deià adds excavation and retaining walls. Add a heat pump, a cover, lighting and decent stone and €60,000–80,000 is common. Treat these as orientation, every plot is different.

A swim spa is a product with a price on it. The Nedar 4.3 is €29,900, the Nedar 5.2 is €36,900 and the Nedar 5.9 Dual, with separate swim and spa zones, is €44,900. Each price includes 21% IVA, delivery in Mallorca and standard installation with ground-level access. It does not include the base or the electrical line. A concrete base at €85–110 per m² for a 6×3 m pad adds about €1,500–2,000, a new 40–50 A line runs €550–1,200 depending on distance, and a crane, which most swim spa deliveries need, is €450–650 for the standard lift. All in, budget €33,000–49,000 depending on model and site.

Timelines

A pool takes months. The licence alone can take three months to a year depending on the council, and that is before a digger arrives. Build time is three to six months more. Start in autumn and you may swim the following summer. Start in spring and you probably will not.

A swim spa is made to order and arrives in six to eight weeks. The base is poured a fortnight before, the line is run while you wait, and the spa is set, filled and heated in a day or two. From deciding to swimming is about two months.

Licences

An in-ground pool is building work and needs a licencia de obra, with a project signed by an architect or engineer. On rustic land, in protected zones or near the coast, the process is longer and sometimes refused.

A swim spa standing on a slab, freestanding, is generally treated like a large hot tub, and a free-standing spa on a private terrace normally needs no building licence in Mallorca. The picture changes if you excavate. A sunken swim spa, with a pit and works, may need a comunicación previa, and some councils treat an excavated swim spa like a pool. On a community terrace you need the community's approval whatever you do. Check with your council and community before you order, and tell us if you are planning to sink it, because it changes the paperwork as well as the price.

Year-round use

This is where the comparison turns. An unheated pool in Mallorca is pleasant from June to September and brave in May and October. From November to April the water sits at 12–16 °C and almost nobody swims. A heat pump extends that, but heating 32,000 litres of open water in January, with evaporation off the surface all night, is a serious electricity bill, and most owners give up and close the pool for the winter.

A swim spa holds 6,500–9,500 litres under a thick insulated cover, in an insulated shell. It stays at whatever temperature you set, 28 °C for swimming, 36 °C for sitting, every day of the year. On a January evening in the Tramuntana foothills it is 10 °C outside and 30 °C in the water. That is the use case: fifty-two weeks instead of twenty.

Running costs

Heating a pool is expensive because the surface is open and the volume is large. Running a heat pump on an 8×4 m pool to keep it at 28 °C through spring and autumn commonly costs several hundred euros a month in electricity, and a lot more if anyone tries it in January. Then there is the filtration pump running eight hours a day, chemicals for 32,000 litres, and water to replace what evaporates, which in July can be 5 mm a day off the surface.

A swim spa, at Mallorca prices of €0.22 per kWh, costs about €90–130 a month in summer and €180–260 in winter to keep at swimming temperature with normal use. That is not cheap, but it buys twelve months of warm water. The filtration runs on a small circulation pump, the chemical dose is for 8,000 litres not 32,000, and the cover keeps evaporation close to zero.

Space

An 8×4 m pool needs the pool, a surround of at least 1 m all round, and a pump room or a buried filtration pit. Call it 60 m² of plot. Many town houses in Santanyí, Sóller or Alaró do not have that, and roof terraces in Palma certainly do not.

A Nedar 5.2 is 520×225 cm. With a step and a walkway on one side it occupies about 18 m². It fits on a wide terrace, in a side garden, or across the end of a courtyard. Weight matters more than area: a filled Nedar 5.2 is around 10 tonnes, so a ground-floor slab is straightforward and a roof terrace needs an engineer's confirmation before anything else.

Maintenance

A pool wants weekly attention in summer: skimming, vacuuming, brushing, backwashing the sand filter, dosing chlorine and acid for a volume that drinks chemicals, and a careful close and reopen each year. Many owners pay a pool company to handle it in season.

A swim spa is maintained like a hot tub. Rinse the cartridge filters weekly in summer, test and adjust the water twice a week, change the water two or three times a year. The cover keeps leaves and dust out and the UV and ozone system on the Signature models takes most of the load off the chlorine. For a second home, a water care visit from €95, or a holiday check from €45 while you are away, keeps it ready. A pool company cannot have a pool warm for your arrival in February. A swim spa will be.

Exercise value

A pool of 8 m gives you four strokes and a turn. Fine for cooling off and children, poor for training unless you fit a counter-current unit at several thousand euros more.

A swim spa is built around the current. The Nedar 4.3 has two swim pumps, the 5.2 has two swim pumps and two massage pumps, and the 5.9 Dual has three swim pumps for a current that will hold a strong swimmer in place. You swim continuously, at a pace you set, with no turns. For anyone recovering from a knee or hip, or a runner who wants low-impact mileage, this is the stronger argument than cost.

Resale and perception

A pool is what buyers in Mallorca expect, and a listing with "piscina" gets more clicks than one without. A good pool adds to a villa's value, though rarely as much as it cost, and a tired one subtracts.

A swim spa is movable property. It does not add to the land value the way a pool does, but it does not commit the next owner either. If you sell, you can leave it as a selling point or take it to the next house. Where a pool was never possible, a swim spa makes the property more attractive without the planning risk.

Who should still build a pool

A pool is the right choice when:

• You have the plot, the budget and the patience for a licence.
• The main use is summer, children, and guests who want to jump in, not laps.
• The house is a holiday let where a pool is expected and a swim spa would need explaining.
• You want a large architectural feature, an infinity edge over the bay, a long lap pool in a finca garden.
• You are building or renovating anyway and the pool is part of the project.

A swim spa is the right choice when:

• Space is tight or the ground is rock.
• You want to swim and soak in January, not just August.
• You want it this season, not next.
• A licence is uncertain, slow or refused.
• Exercise and recovery matter more than a view of blue water.

Where to go from here

The swim spa pages for the Nedar 4.3, Nedar 5.2 and Nedar 5.9 Dual list dimensions, weights and electrical needs for each. If you send us a photo of the space and a rough measurement, we will tell you which model fits, whether a crane is needed, and what the base and line will cost before you compare it with the pool quote.