The Ombudsman, Ángel Gabilondo, has presented his report on the year 2024, highlighting the pressing problem of housing in Spain. "The high purchase and rental prices that housing has reached have become a factor that deepens inequality between citizens and conditions their well-being, their personal development and the enjoyment of the rest of their rights," he noted in the document.
The Ombudsman has warned that the problem of access to housing is more pressing in areas where there is more population and more tourism. "The result is a huge inequality gap with negative consequences on the social situation."
Thus, Gabilondo has urged institutions to "act with the greatest determination" to achieve "the necessary conditions" and adopt the "relevant rules" so that the right of all Spaniards to enjoy decent and adequate housing is fulfilled, as stated in Article 47 of the Spanish Constitution.
Among the nearly 400 pages of the report, the Ombudsman dedicates an entire section to delving into the problem of housing. Thus, he has indicated that the solvency requirements to be able to buy a home, more noticeable in people with "precarious jobs or little savings capacity," "the tension has shifted" towards the demand for rentals.
At the same time, the increase in rental prices means that "many people must make an extra effort to be able to pay for the rented housing." Thus, it estimates that 31% of Spanish households spend more than 40% of their income on rent, "ten points above the European average." Meanwhile, only 35% spend less than a quarter of their income, also below the Union's data.
This multifaceted problem means that "citizens with lower incomes" cannot rent or buy and that workers who have to travel "cannot find housing or cannot afford its price," while young people "see their emancipation delayed."
Faced with this situation, the Ombudsman collects the complaints of citizens who denounce "the long waits that exist, which last for years," to receive public protection housing. Meanwhile, he has also echoed the complaints regarding judicial evictions. In addition, he has highlighted that interested parties must be notified when they are removed from the list of those registered as applicants for public housing.
In this sense, he has recalled that institutions "are obliged to resolve files quickly and efficiently and to allocate resources to achieve this." Meanwhile, he has urged institutions to use the tools of Housing Law 12/2023, which allows the declaration of stressed areas and which only Catalonia and the Basque Country have carried out.
The document states that "a significant increase in the number of public housing units for rent, until reaching at least the European average, is the indispensable starting point to make the social housing policy effective."
