The President of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sánchez, announced yesterday the creation of a new financing line of 4,000 million to boost the construction or remodeling of up to 43,000 new homes intended for social rent or at affordable prices. The objective of the Executive is to speed up the availability of properties intended for leasing at below market prices, and for this reason it calls for collaboration with large private developers, who will be able to access these loans that will be managed the Official Credit Institute (ICO).
Large investment funds will be able to access these loans if they promote social housing. For this reason, the Central Government will impose on these private investors a clause so that these homes are subject to a reinforced protection regime and thus prevent them from being used for a different purpose or from being sold. Public administrations will also be subject to these conditions. The Executive also envisages a transfer of use of properties at reduced prices for at least 50 years.
The loans to promote social rent will be directed, specifically, to the acquisition of land on which to build buildings with housing intended for social rent or to property purchase projects intended for the same purpose that can be promoted by the autonomous communities and town councils . The credits of the ICO will finance both the promotion and the rehabilitation of the properties, as well as the expenses for the development of the real estate actions.
To this ICO line of 4,000 million in loans associated with the addendum to the Next Generation EU, which the Spanish Government is preparing with the European Commission, it is necessary to add a project of 1,000 million already approved in the recovery plan.
It already foresees that the territorial administrations can build, before August 2026, 20,000 new social rental housing in energy efficient buildings, "so that they can be developed through public-private collaboration formulas".
Sánchez yesterday described the percentage of public housing in Spain as "shameful", which is 3%, compared to the total of the park. The Central Government thus established the "need to build or acquire social housing" to promote this model of collaboration between public administrations and the private sector.
The PP, for its part, described the measure advanced yesterday by the Spanish Prime Minister as a "ghost announcement in the middle of the electoral campaign". "It's a reheated dish", said the spokeswoman, Cuca Gamarra, who defended the State pact on housing proposed by Feijóo and pointed out that since Sánchez has been in power, "zero housing" has been built social character
Yesterday's announcement by the Executive is complemented by the mobilization, approved on Tuesday by the Council of Ministers, of a total of 50,000 Sareb homes over the coming years to allocate them to social rent and with the unlocking of the housing law This rule foresees limits to all rent increases and a price intervention in stressed areas if the autonomous regions and town councils decide to apply the measure, which is expected to be approved before May 28.
"Let's make access to housing a right, and not an increasingly exclusive commodity in the hands of a few", added the head of the Executive.
