Booking.com taxes in Costa Rica: the 2026 guide for hosts

Why Booking is not handled like Airbnb

Both are foreign platforms and both charge a commission. In everything else they work the opposite way round, and each different obligation comes from those differences:

If you also list on Airbnb, everything specific to that platform is in the companion guide: Airbnb taxes in Costa Rica. What follows is specific to Booking; what the two share — registration, income regime, calendar — is explained here too, so this guide stands on its own.

The five obligations, in the right order

The first one is not a tax matter, which is exactly why it gets skipped. Law 9742 requires registration with the Tourism Board before providing the service; it is free and done online. If you are not Costa Rican or a resident, you will need a NITE — a special tax ID — before you can register at all. How that works.

3 · Invoicing the stay: what changes with Booking

The stay is invoiced like any other: it is lodging provided in Costa Rica, it carries 13 % VAT, and it goes out as an electronic invoice in the guest's name. What changes with Booking is the timing and the amount, because the money usually passes through your hands and not the platform's.

• The price you publish already includes the VAT. Booking lets you configure whether taxes are included in the rate. They should be: the price the guest sees is the total, and you work the 13 % backwards out of it. A night at US$ 100 is US$ 88.50 of net price and US$ 11.50 of VAT.
• You invoice what you collect, not what you keep. Booking's commission does not reduce the base of the stay: if the guest paid 300, the invoice is for 300. The commission is an expense of yours, separately.
• When to issue it. When you collect. If you collect at the property, that day; if Booking collected for you, when it settles. A booking alone is not income yet: a cancellation with a refund is not invoiced, and one you keep the money on is.
• To whom. If the guest gives an ID number, an invoice in their name; if they are a foreigner without one, with their passport; if they give nothing, a simplified receipt. The VAT is the same in all three cases.

4 · Booking's commission: one invoice, two taxes

Every month Booking sends you an invoice for the commission on that period's bookings, from its Netherlands company. That invoice is not a Costa Rican electronic document: for the expense to exist in your books it has to be issued from your side, with a factura electrónica de compra — a purchase invoice issued by the buyer, which exists precisely for suppliers who cannot issue one here. And because the seller is abroad and not registered locally, that same commission drags two taxes that fall on you.

Its VAT: you settle it

Booking charges you no Costa Rican VAT, but the service is used in Costa Rica, so the 13 % exists anyway. Since you are a registered taxpayer and the supplier is not, the law puts you in the taxpayer's seat for that tax — the reverse charge, article 4 of the VAT Act. In practice:

• Work out 13 % of the commission, at the exchange rate of the day you paid, and declare it as tax due in your monthly return.
• Take it as a credit in the same return, because short-term rental is taxable at 13 %. Cash effect: zero.
• But it has to be declared. Leaving out the output side is an omission, not a formality, even though the net is zero.

The remittance tax Booking does not pay

When someone in Costa Rica pays a foreign company for a service used here, the law requires withholding part of that payment and remitting it: the remittance tax, articles 53 to 59 of the Income Tax Act. For fees and commissions the rate is 25 %. And the tax authority has already said Booking's commission falls there: ruling DGT-831-2021, of 15 July 2021, confirmed that its intermediation commissions are subject to the withholding.

The practical problem is that Booking will not accept less. The invoice is paid in full; there is no way to deduct 25 % the way you would from a local supplier. So the withholding exists anyway and comes out of your pocket. There are two ways to work it out, and which one applies is worth settling with your accountant:

The second is what the tax authority tends to apply when the payer absorbs the supplier's tax: if Booking received ₡300,000 clean, that is 75 % of a ₡400,000 base, and 25 % of that base is ₡100,000. It is more expensive, and it is the one nobody will argue with.

• When it arises. On paying, crediting or making the commission available. With Booking, the day you pay the invoice.
• When it is filed. Monthly, within the first fifteen calendar days of the following month.
• If you do not withhold. Two things. The tax authority can charge you the tax with interest and a penalty, because the party obliged to withhold is you. And the commission stops being a deductible expense: the law conditions the deduction of payments abroad on the withholding having been made.
• It applies even under the flat income regime. The withholding is a tax on what Booking earns, not on what you earn.

From Ticuenta: if your Booking reservations come in through Smoobu, each stay is invoiced automatically. The purchase invoices for the commissions are generated from the monthly file, with the VAT self-assessed — that output and that credit are already in your VAT return draft — and the remittance tax is worked out for the month. See pricing

5 · Declaring the income: the two regimes

What you earn is taxed under one of two regimes, and the choice weighs more with Booking than with Airbnb, because here the commission is a visible expense that one regime lets you deduct and the other does not.

In this example the profits regime saves more than ₡1.5 million a year, because the commission, the withholding and the real costs weigh more than the blind 15 %. But it requires an employee on the payroll, bookkeeping and an annual return, and it commits you for five years. With few costs, or a single small property, the property income regime wins on simplicity.

Everything together: what you keep from US$ 4,000

A month with twelve bookings you collected yourself, US$ 4,000 in total with taxes included, the commission paid by transfer, under the property income regime:

That 57 % is the figure worth carrying when you set prices. Anyone budgeting on “I keep 85 %” is counting the VAT as if it were theirs and forgetting two taxes.

The Booking host's calendar

What Booking tells the tax authority about you

Since 1 January 2025, under resolution MH-DGT-RES-0025-2024, every platform that lists or collects payment for short-term rentals in Costa Rica must verify who each host is and report it once a year, by 30 April. The first report, covering 2025, was filed in April 2026. What Booking sends about you:

• Name, identification, date of birth and address.
• Your Costa Rican tax ID, if you gave them one.
• The address of each property you rent out.
• What you were paid quarter by quarter and how many bookings.
• Whose name the bank account receiving the money is in.
• The commissions and taxes the platform charged or withheld.

This is not a new obligation for you — it is information. But it changes the picture: the tax authority can line up what Booking reports against what you declared, and against the account that received the money. For anyone who never declared, the exposure is concrete: 12.75 % of everything collected for the years still open, plus interest, plus a penalty starting at 50 % of the unpaid tax. The rule comes from Costa Rica's commitments to the OECD, and applies to every platform equally.

The mistakes that repeat

• Invoicing the net that reached the bank

  When Booking collects for you, the net arrives with the commission taken out. The invoice goes out for what the guest paid; the commission is a separate transaction.

• Paying the commission and doing nothing else

  A bank transfer to Booking is not a tax document. Without the purchase invoice the expense does not exist; without the withholding it is not deductible; without the VAT self-assessment your return is incomplete.

• Thinking no VAT on the invoice means no VAT

  Booking does not charge it because it is not registered here, not because it does not exist. You declare the 13 % as output and as input; leaving it out is an omission even though the net is zero.

• Assuming the withholding does not apply because the service is provided in Holland

  The law looks at where the service is used, and the intermediation of a booking in Guanacaste is used in Guanacaste. The tax authority put it in writing in DGT-831-2021.

• Budgeting on 85 %

  Of what you collect, the VAT is not yours, the commission costs more than it says, and income tax is charged on the gross. With the numbers above, you keep 57 % before running costs.

Quick answers

Does Booking charge me VAT on its invoice?

No. Booking is not registered with the Costa Rican tax authority and its invoice arrives without Costa Rican VAT. You declare the 13 % in your return, as output and as input.

Can I withhold the 25 % from Booking instead of paying it myself?

In practice, no: the invoice is paid in full and Booking does not process withholdings. That is why the host absorbs it, and — on the prudent basis — on a grossed-up amount.

If I am on the property income regime, do I still have to withhold?

Yes. Your regime not letting you deduct the commission does not change the fact that you are paying a foreign company. The withholding is separate from your own income tax.

What if the guest pays me directly and Booking only introduced them?

That is the most common case, and it changes nothing: the stay is invoiced for what was collected, and the commission Booking invoices monthly follows the same circuit of purchase invoice, VAT and withholding.

Do I have to give Booking my tax ID?

The platform is required to verify your details and report your tax identification if it has it. Giving it is the coherent thing to do once you are registered: what Booking reports will then match what you declare.

I also rent out through Airbnb — does it all go together?

Yes: one registration, one VAT return and one income tax return, covering the stays and the commissions of both. What differs between platforms is how each commission is handled; Airbnb's is in its own guide.

The short version

• Tourism Board registration before you operate; tax registration before you collect.
• Every stay with an electronic invoice and 13 % VAT, on what the guest paid.
• Every Booking invoice with its own purchase invoice, and its 13 % VAT self-assessed and credited in the same return.
• 25 % remittance tax on the commission, monthly, out of your own pocket.
• Income tax under property income (12.75 % of gross, monthly) or profits (scale on net, annual, with the commission and the withholding deductible).
• Booking reports your income, bookings and bank account every 30 April.

About this guide. The reverse charge comes from article 4 of the VAT Act; the card-issuer collection aimed at consumers, from its article 30 and the list of foreign providers the tax authority updated with effect from 8 September 2026; the remittance tax, from articles 53 to 59 of the Income Tax Act and ruling DGT-831-2021; the platform reporting, from resolution MH-DGT-RES-0025-2024. The 25 % rate is the one for fees and commissions; some advisors apply the 30 % rate for “other remittances” to platform services, and that is a conversation to have with your accountant before your first filing. Examples use round exchange rates so the arithmetic can be followed.

Verified as of 24 September 2026. Tax rules change. This is information, not tax advice — confirm the current version before applying any of it to a real case.

Sources: Ministry of Finance Current legal texts (Sinalevi) Costa Rican Tourism Board

Also in English

• Airbnb taxes in Costa Rica: the 2026 guide for foreign hosts
• The NITE: the tax ID a foreign host needs in Costa Rica
• Ticuenta for foreign owners: what it does and what it costs