Spain, at the tail end of Europe in social housing

Spain is at the back of Europe social housingwith 450,000 properties. your percentage does not reach 3% of the total park. A far figure compared to that Netherlandswhere this type of property represents 30% of the park, i.e Austria (24%), Denmark (20%) or Sweden (19%).

Along with Spain, in the lower part of the European table are Romania (1.5%); Estonian (1.7%); Croatia (1.8%) or Portugal, with 2%according to data collected in the special section on social housing of the Housing and Land Observatory, which depends on the Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda.

Bulgaria (2.5%) or Slovakia and Hungary (3%) have percentages similar to Spain’s, despite the fact that they are much lower than Spain in terms of population.

Among the most populous countries of the European Union (EU), the burden of social housing varies greatly. IN Germany is 3.9%; in France 17%; in it United Kingdom it is close to 18%; in Italy is 3.7%; in Poland 7.6% and in Belgium 6.5%.

With these data, Spain should increase the existing stock of social housing by almost 8% every year in order to approach the EU average, whose stock is 19 million social properties (9.3% of the total).

Who owns these houses in Spain? They are basically owned by autonomous communities and town halls.

According to data from this study, Andalucía is the leader in the number of social housing units, with around 50,000 publicly owned rental units, followed by the Basque Country, with 24,000 units, and the Community of Madrid, with more than 20,000 units. .

Pedro Sánchez admits that the data from Spain is “shameful”

This week the Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchezhe recognized that the percentage of social housing in Spain, which does not reach 3%, is “small”, “ridiculous”, “shameful” and “red”.

On the eve of regional and municipal elections on May 28 The goal is to increase the number of publicly rented homes by 20% in a short period of time, a goal he described as ambitious, but which he understands as fair and appropriate.

In recent days, the executive power announced that it will mobilize 50,000 homes and land from work together for public housing, and with a new financing line with European funds of HRK 4,000 million to finance the promotion of another 43,000 houses for rent at affordable prices.

Not enough effort: 1.5 million more properties needed

According to a recent study by Research by BBVAreaching the average volume of social housing (7% of the total fund) of the group of developed countries (OECD), would require the construction of another 1.5 million properties of this type in Spain.

For this reason, although the Government’s commitment to mobilize 50,000 Sareb homes and finance the construction of 43,000 is the first step in the right direction to reactivate this policy that has failed in recent years, everything indicates that it will not be enough to cover the current deficit of the territory.

The government’s plans will increase supply, but these measures alone will not serve to extinguish it hot prices due to which about 13 million households met one of the two criteria for declaration highlighted area: that the rate of effort to pay for your house exceeds 30% or that it is an area where price growth is three percentage points above the CPI. This number of households represents 61% of the total number. More than six out of ten homes in Spain.

If only the income criterion is considered, 23.6% of the census tracts would be highlighted, with Madrid, Barcelona, ​​Malaga and Alicante leading the municipalities. The problem is that most of the houses in these areas are in work together They are located outside the urban centers, where the increases are the most visible.

Relaxing the prices is essential in order to facilitate access to young people, who mostly opt for this option when it comes to becoming independent. “Even though it seems like it is lease The regime could best adapt to them, it is not easy to access at the moment. Young people enter the labor market with higher unemployment rates, more temporary jobs and low wages; this insecurity makes it impossible for them to accumulate wealth, and to this is added the rise in prices, a product of economic growth, changes in the composition of the population and non-response of the supply,” the analysts point out.

This lack of response is visible in all public administrations, which Since the 1990s, they have paralyzed the development of social housing. According to the latest Sector Observatory prepared by the Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda for 2020, the country has passed from building more than a million affordable homes in the 1980s to just 167,000 between 2011 and 2019.. In an environment where, moreover, the number of inhabitants has not stopped growing.

The causes of its decline

Experts suggest that behind this ignore is commitment to free housing, at higher prices that, among other things, They also enable more revenue through taxes such as IBI. That is why they advise increasing investments in the sector, both public and private. In the latest budgets for 2023, planned spending on access to housing is 3.472 million, which is significantly higher than in previous years, but still insufficient to meet long-term commitments.