Barcelona is at the forefront of the problem of rental housing in Spain for standing out in the two main obstacles: a rise in prices that consolidates it as the most expensive in the country with, at the same time, a huge drop in supply.
On the one hand, according to the data provided to EL MUNDO by the Idealista portal, prices in the last four years in Barcelona are above average and have risen by 16%, compared to an increase in the most comparable city, Madrid, of 5.1% in the same period. It is the evolution of prices per square meter between March 2019 and the same month of 2023.
Specifically, according to this leading real estate portal in the country, apartments are currently rented in Barcelona at 18.4 euros per square meter, which is higher than any other city, including the also highly stressed Madrid (16.2) and San Sebastián. (15.7) as can be seen in the attached graph. This strong evolution is what emerges in the statistics, despite the rhetoric of the mayoress, Ada Colau, and the rent control measures adopted by the Generalitat of Catalonia.
At the same time, Barcelona is the only city, along with Cuenca, that has registered a cut of more than 50% in the supply of rental housing since the first quarter of 2019, almost double the average drop in Spain since he governed Pedro Sánchez, which is 28%, as EL MUNDO published this Tuesday. In the case of Barcelona, ??the 36,600 homes that were offered for rent in the first quarter of 2019 have dropped to 17,700 four years later, 51%, according to data from the portal.
It also surpasses other highly stressed cities such as Valencia (45% drop) and Madrid (44%) in this poor indicator of access to housing. Only Cuenca, with incomparable characteristics, surpasses the city governed by Colau.
In proportion, some 11 rental homes have been lost for every thousand inhabitants in Barcelona compared to about eight in Madrid.
On the other side of this balance are municipalities in which the supply has increased. The greatest increase has occurred in the city of Huesca (122%) and Córdoba (101%), which have doubled the number of homes available for rent. They are followed by Palencia (83%), Jaén (56%), Teruel (34%), Valladolid (21%), Salamanca (8%), Pamplona (6%) and Lugo (2%). Castellón de la Plana has not registered any changes.
The increase in supply in Huesca has not served to cushion prices, which have grown by 32%. But there is a correlation in Córdoba, where, according to Idealista, they have only risen an average of 1% in these four years. In Palencia (5.6% increase since 2019) and Valladolid (7.8%) are also examples of increased supply and price increases below the Spanish average.
The new Housing Law that is voted on this Thursday goes, however, in the opposite direction to increase the offer, The governor of the Bank of Spain, Pablo Hernández de Cos, questioned again this Tuesday in Logroño, according to Europa Press, the control of prices provided for in the standard. “In the short term it can generate a price reduction effect, but with a medium and long term vision, it can have negative effects on the supply.”
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
