A private court sounds like a simple request until you start looking. Most Maresme villas were never built with one, the houses that have a court rarely say so in the headline, and the court itself is either clay that drinks water or a hard surface that cracks in the sun. Here is how the search really works.
Forget the portals for a second. Tennis courts cluster in a handful of places, and they cluster for a reason: you need a plot of roughly 1,500 square metres before a court makes sense next to a pool, a garden and a house. That means the big private urbanizaciones above the coast — Supermaresme on the Llavaneres and Sant Vicenç border, Sant Berger in Teià, Rocaferrera and Bellaire in Llavaneres, the hills above Cabrils and Alella. Inland, the old masies around Òrrius, Dosrius and Arenys de Munt sometimes have one, usually tired and usually at the end of a track.
The other pattern is age. Villas built in the late 1990s and 2000s were sold with a court as a status item. Newer builds tend to spend that space on a padel court instead, because padel needs a third of the footprint and the owners actually play it. If you specifically want tennis, older stock is where to look — and older stock is exactly what does not photograph well.
Asking rents for a long-term villa with a private tennis court in the upper Maresme typically land between €6,000 and €12,000 a month. That is not a court premium — it is the price of a 4–6 bedroom house on a big plot with a pool, and the court is part of the package. An older house further inland, with a court that needs work, can come in around €4,000–5,500. Front-line sea or the top of Supermaresme pushes past €15,000. Holiday lets are a different market entirely: weekly and nightly rates, and a court there is worth roughly €200–400 a week in high season.
One thing worth saying plainly: do not pay a big premium for the court alone. The difference between two similar villas, one with a court and one without, is usually 5–10% at most. What you are really paying for is land, and land is what Maresme has stopped making.
Tierra batida is the romantic answer and the demanding one. It needs watering, sometimes twice a day in July, rolling, sweeping and a top dressing every couple of years. In return you get a slower bounce, cooler feet and a court that looks like a postcard. A hard court is cheaper to keep, plays faster and turns into a frying pan by two in the afternoon. Both crack if the base was done badly, and both need the fence and net checked before you sign anything.
Orientation matters more than people expect. A court running east–west means one player stares into the afternoon sun for the whole second set. A court on the sea side of the house catches the breeze and the salt; the salt eats the fence and the net hardware. And if the court sits under pine trees, you will spend every Saturday in May sweeping needles instead of playing.
Put the court in the inventory with the net, the posts, the covers and anything else that comes with it. Then separate the obligations in writing: structural work and resurfacing on the owner, watering, sweeping and nets on the tenant, or whatever split you agree. Vague is expensive here. If the villa sits in an urbanización, check the community rules as well — some ban floodlights after midnight, and a few have opinions about noise that reach further than you would think.
And check the insurance. A standard homeowner policy may not cover a court used commercially, and a standard tenant policy usually does not cover damage to a sports surface. If the owner is renting the house out as a business, that is their problem to solve — but ask to see that it is solved.
The honest advice: rent the house you actually like and join a club ten minutes away. The R1 towns all have municipal courts, and there are small private clubs scattered between Mataró and Sant Pol where a family membership costs less per year than one month of the premium you would pay for a private court. A court you use twice a week is not worth a worse house, a worse commute and a garden you never sit in.
We are Grandiora, based between Barcelona and Maresme. We see these houses from the inside, including the ones that never make it to a portal, and we can tell you which courts are worth paying for.
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