“During the pandemic, everyone predicted that people would flee cities and never return, but just the opposite has happened,” he said. “We have to intervene in the market because it’s clear the market hasn’t been able to handle this situation on its own.”
Collboni noted the rent cap is a short-term measure designed to stop the crisis from growing even more dire, but that any long-term solution to Europe’s housing problems will require a dramatic increase in the number of affordable public homes. Before major construction projects are green-lit, however, he urged national, regional and local leaders to reexamine their approach to public housing, emphasizing that demand is no longer limited to the most vulnerable members of society.
“We need housing policies that are much broader, and that understand that this problem now affects urban working and middle class families,” he stressed, highlighting that 75 percent of Barcelona’s residents are potential beneficiaries of housing assistance.
Construction isn’t a silver bullet
Collboni also pointed out that in many cities —Barcelona among them — the construction of new homes isn’t a realistic solution.
“Barcelona is geographically fenced in by the sea, the mountains and neighboring municipalities,” he said. “We’re constructing three new neighborhoods that can potentially host up to 45,000 homes — half of which will be public — but after that, there’s nowhere else to build.”
That’s why the city’s municipal authorities are also working to expand public housing stock, and they’re doing so by exercising the city’s legal right of first refusal, which gives them first dibs on buildings being sold in areas where the market is stressed and there’s little room for new-builds. Over the past decade, together with Catalonia’s regional government, the city has acquired over 7,000 apartments that are now being let at affordable prices.
Casa Orsola, an iconic building in the central Eixample district, is the city’s latest conquest. Initially purchased by an investment firm that intended to evict long-time residents and turn their homes into tourist rentals, authorities intervened after major protests earlier this month. Teaming up with a social housing organization, the city purchased the property for 30 percent below market price.
“We’re changing the rules that have allowed us to end up in this situation, so that investment groups and others understand these operations will no longer be lucrative in Barcelona,” Collboni said. “We have plenty of other sectors one can invest in here; let them focus on those.”