NEW STRAITS TIMES. 11TH MAY: The government of the Spanish region of Catalonia has told landlords to find occupants for empty properties they own or risk them being expropriated.
A plan announced this week to repurpose up to 70 houses empty for over two years in 14 towns where low-income housing is in high demand could be expanded in scope and budget, a senior official told Reuters on Wednesday.
It comes two weeks before Spain holds local elections with affordable housing being one of the key themes amid a flurry of announcements by the central government to address the issue.
Government figures show Spain offers citizens just 290,000 public housing units covering 1.6 per cent of households compared to 30 per cent in the Netherlands and 16.8 per cent in France.
“The government’s wish is to mobilise these houses, not to get to the stage of expropriating them,” said Juli Fernandez, the Catalan government’s head of housing.
The government originally earmarked 45 municipalities but only 14 agreed to take part, with Barcelona not being included. It said on Tuesday it has budgeted five million euros for potential expropriations, which it estimates would cover the cost of buying 50-70 houses for half their market value.
The programme, which will come into force in the coming days, gives one month to property owners to explain why they are empty. Without reasonable justification, they then have three months to agree to sell the house to the government or put it up for rent. If none of that happens, the government would have three months to expropriate it.
Carles Sala, spokesperson of Catalonia’s real estate agents association API, said the plan would fuel business insecurity and dent investor confidence, arguing the solution is to invest more in social housing.