Préstamo para estudios: a loan, not a grant
This page is about borrowing money and repaying it with interest. The useful part is that Spanish consumer credit has no approved-provider list: the bank lends to you, so it makes no difference that Code Labs Academy is a German school teaching online. Before any bank, though, there is cheaper money. Your employer first, then our own interest-free monthly instalments, up to 60 payments made directly to Code Labs Academy.
What is actually available in Spain, cheapest money first
Start with the part a lender's own page would never put first: a préstamo para estudios is debt. The bank pays out, you pay Code Labs Academy in full, and then you repay the bank with interest for years afterwards, whatever happens to your career in the meantime. It is not a grant, not a subsidy and not a Spanish version of the training vouchers people read about in Germany. Spain's public training money is real, but it is spent through SEPE, Fundae and the regional employment services, and all of those routes pay providers inscribed in the Registro Estatal de Entidades de Formación or in its regional equivalents. Code Labs Academy is a German company and is not inscribed, so our courses are not bonificables and no Spanish training credit can be redirected to us. So the honest order of options here is not the order a bank would show you. First ask your employer, because company money is the only money that costs you nothing: training related to your job is not retribución en especie for you and is a deductible expense for the company, with no registry and no paperwork with the Administración. Second, price our own payment plan: interest free, up to 60 monthly payments made directly to Code Labs Academy, so the total you pay is the course fee and nothing more. Third, if you have the cash, there is a discount for paying the full fee upfront. Any loan, at any rate, costs more than an interest-free plan for the same tuition, and we would rather you knew that before you signed anything. A loan earns its place in one situation: you need the fee, or the fee plus living costs, as a lump sum. And in that situation the mechanism is genuinely clean, which is the thing most readers assume will stop them. Consumer credit in Spain has no provider accreditation anywhere in it. The borrower is the student, the bank assesses you and your income, and the school is simply where the money goes. That a bootcamp is taught from Germany, online and in English is not a question any lender has a box for. The clearest fit we have verified is MyInvestor, which lends from EUR 3,000 to EUR 50,000 at a fixed rate, explicitly for a máster, a posgrado or a curso de formación, with no arrangement fee and no early-repayment fee, no aval and no obligation to domicile your nómina, and no geographic restriction stated on the product. Two things to check before you commit to anything: MyInvestor pays the money into the school's account, and whether it will transfer to our German IBAN is not something we can confirm for you, so ask the bank outright; and you need to be a MyInvestor client, resident in Spain, and to pass its solvency assessment like any other borrower. Beyond that, CaixaBank sells a Préstamo Exprés Estudios for courses and másters, Banco Sabadell runs financing built for bootcamps that Spanish schools already use, and an ordinary préstamo personal always works, because no bank needs to approve the school to lend you money. One warning that saves people a wasted afternoon: several banks market a student product written around matrícula at a university, for a grado or a posgrado. A private bootcamp is not a university, so ask which product you are actually being offered before you fill in a form. We publish no rates on this page, and you will see why below.
For our own instalment plan the only test is being accepted onto a course. No credit check, no lender, no residency condition and nobody outside this conversation to convince. You agree the schedule with us before your cohort starts and the payments go directly to Code Labs Academy.
Employer funding has no gate either, beyond your employer saying yes. Job-related training paid by the company is not taxable in-kind income for you and is a deductible expense for them, with no registry and no application to any authority. The business case and the email to send are on our page about training paid for by your employer.
A bank loan is the one route with a real gate, and it is about you, not about us. Lenders generally require you to be resident in Spain with provable income, and every file goes through an affordability and credit assessment. Existing debts, a short income history or an entry in a defaulters file such as ASNEF can all sink an application. Approval is never automatic and each bank decides case by case.
There is no accreditation test on the school, and that is the whole point. This is private consumer credit: the bank lends to you personally and we invoice you. The Registro Estatal de Entidades de Formación that governs every Fundae and SEPE euro in Spain plays no part in it, so our being German is not an obstacle a bank has any way to object to.
MyInvestor is the product we have verified as the closest fit. It lends from EUR 3,000 to EUR 50,000 at a fixed rate, explicitly for a máster, a posgrado or a curso de formación, with no arrangement fee, no early-repayment fee, no aval and no requirement to domicile your nómina, and no geographic restriction stated on the product. You do have to be a MyInvestor client and resident in Spain, and the credit decision is theirs alone.
Before you borrow, check whether something cheaper reaches you. If you are under 30, unemployed and living in Madrid, the region reimburses part of a course you choose yourself: see cheque formación de la Comunidad de Madrid. If you invoice as an autónomo, the fee is a deductible business expense, which changes the real cost of the whole exercise: see training as a deductible expense for autónomos.
Frequently asked questions
Is a préstamo para estudios public funding of any kind?
No, and it matters that you understand that before you sign. It is an ordinary consumer loan sold by a bank with the purpose written on the label. The money is yours to repay with interest over the agreed term, and nothing about it is subsidised by the State. Spain's public training money runs through SEPE, Fundae and the regional employment services, and every one of those routes pays providers inscribed in the Registro Estatal de Entidades de Formación or its regional equivalents. Code Labs Academy is not inscribed, so our courses are not bonificables and no training credit can be redirected to us. The genuinely public route that does reach a course you choose yourself is regional and narrow: the cheque formación de la Comunidad de Madrid, for unemployed under-30s living in Madrid. That is why this page puts your employer and our own interest-free instalments ahead of any bank.
Will a Spanish bank really lend for an online course taught from Germany?
In principle yes, and this is the part most people get wrong. The loan is made to you, not to the school, and consumer credit in Spain has no approved-provider list anywhere in it. There is no registry to be on, no homologación to hold and no box on the form for where the teaching happens. MyInvestor's product is written for a máster, a posgrado or a curso de formación with no geographic restriction stated, which describes what you would be buying. Two practical points before you get excited. First, several banks sell a student product framed around matrícula at a university, for a grado or a posgrado, and a private bootcamp is not a university, so ask which product you are being offered rather than assuming. Second, some lenders, MyInvestor among them, pay the school directly, and we bank in Germany, so ask the bank in writing whether it will transfer to a foreign IBAN before you commit. Code Labs Academy is certified under AZAV, the German quality standard for publicly funded training providers. It carries no legal weight in Spain and no lender will ask for it, but it is a fair thing to mention if someone wants to know who they would be paying.
Is borrowing cheaper than paying Code Labs Academy in instalments?
No, and we would rather say so than have you work it out after signing. Our plan is interest free, up to 60 monthly payments made directly to Code Labs Academy, so the total you pay is the course fee. A loan costs the fee plus interest, however good the rate looks. The argument for a loan is a different one: it puts cash in your hand, which a payment plan does not. If you need to cover living costs during an intensive cohort, or you want the fee settled in a single payment to take the upfront discount, borrowing can be the right tool. If all you want is to spread the tuition, it is not, and no comparison of rates will change that arithmetic.
What rate will I pay, and why does this page not tell me?
Because we do not set it and it moves. The rate on a study loan is fixed by the lender when your file is approved, it is published on their site, and it depends on the amount, the term and your own profile. A figure printed here would be out of date within months, and a stale number on a page about somebody's debt is a real harm, not a small inaccuracy. What we can tell you is how to read an offer. Compare the TAE rather than the headline rate, because the TAE is where fees and any bundled insurance show up. Ask for the total amount repayable in writing before you agree to anything. Check for an arrangement fee, for a penalty on early repayment and for whether an insurance policy or an account has been bundled in to get the advertised rate. And treat any advertised rate as indicative until the lender has run its own checks on you.
What happens if the bank refuses me, or offers me a worse product?
Both happen, and they are different problems. A refusal is usually about your file rather than about the course: income that leaves too little headroom, existing loan commitments, a short history in Spain or an entry in a defaulters file. Ask what tipped the decision, because the answer tells you whether a smaller amount, a longer term, a guarantor or simply another bank would change it. Lenders assess independently of each other and a no from one is not a no from all of them. Being offered a plain préstamo personal instead of the training product is not a refusal at all, it is a price, so compare the TAE against another offer before you accept. And a refusal does not close the course to you: our interest-free instalment plan involves no lender and no credit decision, your employer may still say yes, and a shorter self-paced course from our current catalogue needs far less money in the first place.
What if I lose my job or do not finish the course?
The loan stands. It is an ordinary credit agreement, unconnected to your studies or your future earnings, so the schedule does not move because the course or the job search went differently than you hoped. That is the real price of having cash in hand, and it should be a deliberate choice rather than an afterthought. Borrow the amount you could still service in a bad six months, not the amount you can service in a good one. If your situation changes, speak to the bank before you miss a payment, because a default is reported and follows you for years. Our own instalment plan is just as serious a commitment, but it carries no interest and no third party, which is one more reason to price it first.
Get personalised advice
Not sure what’s realistic for you in Spain? Book a 1:1 consultation with our education specialists. We’ll walk you through instalment options (including recurring euro payments via SEPA where available), current discounts, and how employer sponsorship typically works in Spain (including FUNDAE documentation needs). If you’re considering a public training route via SEPE or your region, we’ll also help you understand what to check so you can make an informed decision.
