He economic effort to access the rental is at “historic highs” in Catalonia, from 15% in 2001 and with ups and downs to 22% in 2023according to a study by the Chamber of Commerce of Barcelona financed by the Department of Business and Labor of the Generalitat. “It is the heart of the problem” of housing, explained this Tuesday the head of the Cabinet of Economic Studies and Infrastructure, Joan Ramon Rovira, together with the president of the Chamber, Josep Santacreuto present the study ‘L’accessibilitat a l’habitatge a Catalunya’.
For his part, the average mortgage effort to purchase a home is similar to the beginning of the centurybut the especially intense increase in job insecurity among the most vulnerable groups since financial crisis caused a sharp increase in the demand for rental apartments. According to the study, the effort to pay a lease is higher on the coast of Barcelona and Girona than in the inland areas and in the Tarragona district, and they are Sant Cugat, Badalona and Barcelona the most affected cities, in this order.
It is also higher for low incomes, young people and the foreign population, which are those groups “with a greater probability of living in a rental regime.” Furthermore, the mortgage effort – stable from 2015 to 2019 – has also increased, especially in cities such as Barcelona, Sant Cugat or L’Hospitalet, due to the interest rate spike in 2022.
40% of the income
The study indicates that for 20.7% of the Spanish population renting (at market price), the cost of renting was more than 40% of your disposable income in 2020. Rovira has assessed that these data generate difficulties for the most affected groups to “create a life plan” and that, therefore, difficulties related to housing deteriorate the state of well-being.
The fall of average number of people per household, a longer life expectancy and the increase in foreign population These are some of the structural factors that the study raises regarding the change in demand. Regarding supply, the construction of new homes suffers lack of adequate labor and qualified, administrative difficulties to process licenses and lack of a stable regulatory framework.
Another of the structural changes in the offer proposed by the study is that residential tourism has risen from 45% in 2015 to 61% in 2022. Asked about the Catalan regulation of tourist apartments, Santacreu has assessed that a unique approach for the whole of Catalonia “does not make sense” and that you must look municipality by municipality.
Improvement proposals
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Santacreu has assessed that there is “a serious structural problem“which needs major changes and a great consensus and long-term political pact to confront it. Among the report’s proposals to solve the problem is to increase the available supply of rental housing – through mobilization of public and private land that already exists and public-private collaboration – and a greater budgetary effort aimed at social housing spending policies.
Likewise, it proposes policies to promote lower population pressure in large urban centers such as the promotion of a integrated and intermodal transport network and the development of new urban plans that improve social services in rural areas.