A house on wheels and a request for prison time: where is the common sense?

There are stories I find hard to understand. A resident of Casabermeja, Málaga, is facing a request for 15 months in prison for placing a mobile home on a plot of land he owns. My first thought is: is there really no more reasonable way to deal with situations like this?

It is important to clarify one thing: there has been no conviction; this is a request by the Public Prosecutor’s Office, and the case is awaiting trial, according to the article published by Xataka. But the fact that a prison sentence has even been requested in circumstances like these is, in my view, reason enough for reflection.

If it has wheels and can be removed, why treat it like a permanent structure?

According to the article, the owner bought a 3,127 m² plot of land classified as rural land and placed a second-hand mobile home on it. His defence argues that it has no foundations, rests on wheels and can be removed in a matter of minutes. It also says that the owner did not live there and intended to use it to store tools and tend a small vegetable garden.

That is the defence’s account, and the court will have to determine which facts are proven. But if those circumstances are confirmed, it seems reasonable to ask: should a genuinely mobile unit be treated in the same way as a home built on and fixed to the land?

In my view, it should not.

A brick-and-mortar house changes a plot of land in a very different way from a unit that retains its wheels, has no foundations and can be removed. I believe that distinction should carry real weight in the regulations, rather than being dismissed as an insignificant detail.

I am not saying that anything on wheels should be allowed anywhere. I am saying that actual mobility, how it is used and its impact on the land should matter.

Protecting the land should not mean making everything more complicated

I understand that local councils need to control how land is used. Nobody wants the countryside to turn into an improvised housing development or protected areas to be damaged.

But protecting the land is one thing; applying a response that does not adequately distinguish between different situations is another.

In my view, building a permanent home, with all the associated construction and installations, is not comparable to placing a mobile unit on a plot that, according to its owner, is not even being used as a place to live. Before resorting to such serious measures, the authorities should carefully examine what has actually been done, what harm has occurred and whether the issue can be resolved by removing the unit.

Proportionality should also be part of urban planning.

And yes, we should also talk about the drive to raise revenue

There is another issue that makes me wary: how easily any initiative by a property owner seems to become surrounded by permits, paperwork and costs.

At times, I get the impression that, for local councils, the answer to everything is to demand yet another document and another payment. That approach fuels the feeling that raising revenue matters more than finding reasonable solutions.

I have no evidence that this was the Casabermeja Council’s motive in this case. Also, it was the Public Prosecutor’s Office—not the council—that requested the prison sentence. But that does not mean we cannot question a system in which citizens struggle to tell where protection of the land ends and excessive bureaucracy begins.

If an authority requires a permit, it should clearly explain what it is protecting and why that requirement is necessary. It is not enough for the property owner simply to end up paying: any oversight must have an understandable justification.

What I consider reasonable is not what current case law says

There is an important point I do not want to gloss over: having wheels does not automatically exempt a mobile home from the requirement to obtain planning permission.

The Spanish Supreme Court has ruled that, for these purposes, mobile homes may be treated like prefabricated houses, even if they retain some capacity to move. Its reasoning focuses on their design and purpose as accommodation, not solely on whether they can be transported.

That is the current legal interpretation. My view is that there should be a clearer distinction between a unit intended to remain in place as a home and a genuinely mobile unit with no foundations and a different use.

Arguing that the rules should change does not mean we can ignore the rules that are currently in force. Anyone considering buying a plot of land and placing a mobile home on it should first check what is permitted and which authorisations are required. Relying solely on the fact that it has wheels could prove very costly.

Fewer blanket rules and more common sense

Owning a plot of land does not give anyone the right to do whatever they want with it. I understand that perfectly. But that does not mean we should accept every restriction or penalty without question.

What I am calling for is regulation that distinguishes between different situations, considers the actual impact and allows issues to be put right without turning every dispute into a matter with enormous consequences.

If a unit is genuinely mobile, has no foundations and can be removed, I do not believe it should automatically be treated as a permanent home. And if it is not being used as a residence, that fact should be carefully considered.

Protecting the land is necessary. But protecting it with common sense, transparency and proportionality is necessary too.

Because there should be room for a reasonable solution between allowing everything and requesting a prison sentence.

Sources: Xataka article and the Spanish Supreme Court’s official statement on mobile homes and planning permission.