The central government has announced that it plans to approve during this month of February the supporting report presented by the Generalitat of Catalonia according to which 140 Catalan municipalities would be considered “stressed residential market areas”, in which measures to contain rental prices will be applied. .
They will soon settle, approve and publish the new state reference index of rental prices that must be applied to limit rents and that draws on the pioneering work created by the Catalan Habitat Agency.
The rental price, in the new contracts, may not exceed the price of the contract in force during the last five years.
In cases of owners of more than five homes, or when the property has not been rented in the last five years, the price of the new rental will be limited to that set by this reference index that will be made public soon.
Yes, the annual rent update may be applied in any case, which in 2024 is capped at 3%. No new expenses that were not provided for in the previous contract may be passed on to the tenant.
Once the declaration of stressed areas is approved, tenants with expiring contracts have the option of requesting an extraordinary extension that may be extended annually for a maximum of three years. The landlord must accept it.
The exceptions to this extension are a different agreement between the two parties or if the owner needs to recover the home for himself or a close relative and this is stipulated in the rental contract.
Tenants who rent to live permanently in the home - not those who rent temporarily or rooms - will be able to enjoy high reductions on income subject to personal income tax.
They will be those who sign a new contract as of May 26, 2023, the date of entry into force of the new Law, who will access a 90% bonus by reducing the rental price, 5% compared to the previous contract; 70% when renting the home for the first time to young people up to 35 years old; or 60% for having carried out improvement works on the home. In other cases, the reduction for renting a habitual residence will be 50%.
Primary residence contracts signed prior to May 26, 2023 will continue to enjoy a general bonus of 60%. Those who rent a property for use other than housing must pay tax on all income generated.
The Sindicat de Llogateres de Catalunya has repeatedly complained that the new Housing Law is late, and that it is "full of holes", in the words of Carme Arcarazo, its spokesperson.
Due to pressure from Esquerra Republicana, the legal text, and especially the points related to income containment, are inspired by the predecessor Law 11/2020 for the regulation of rental prices, applicable in Catalonia.
The Catalan law was, according to Arcarazo, "very effective" because it managed to freeze the rental price and the supply of apartments was maintained. But the Supreme Court struck down part of that law because it considered that Catalonia did not have enough powers.
It took four years and a state law for Catalonia to finally declare its tension zones and thus apply the limits as soon as possible.
In fact, it was the first to try, in September 2023, but it did not reach a deal with the central government: "There has been no agreement [...] regarding the index," lamented Minister Ester Capella a few years ago. months. "The Ministry wants to apply a homogeneous one, and we demand that the Catalan index be applied."
"We have done all the necessary work, among other things, because we already had an index and some studies on the most affected areas," he highlighted. Things in the palace go slowly, yes, but the population deserves transparency, assertiveness and efficiency, since legal uncertainty is paid for, in the end, by landlords and tenants.
