A decree with the proposal of permanent automatic extension of the rental contracts as a nod to its Sumar partners and the promoters of the camping in Sol, and another decree with the rest of the measures to try to achieve the support of the parliamentary majority. It is the result of 48 frenetic hours of negotiation, after which the Government came out this Tuesday to present a battery of measures to combat the housing crisis. As the main novelties, Moncloa has announced its intention to "paralyze speculative purchases" of large funds, a 4% reduction in VAT on the construction of public and protected housing, and a new instrument called Tu Casa by which the State itself becomes a lender for renting families to provide them with type 0 financing with which to give them access to a mortgage. "Up to 20% of the value of the home with a maximum of 50,000 euros and with management through the ICO," explained the minister of the sector, Isabel Rodríguez.
"It is an agreement that rebuilds the majority in parliament that wants to serve the social majority of our country," Rodríguez defended during his appearance after the meeting of the Council of Ministers. As detailed by the minister, the most extensive decree includes measures such as extending the anti-eviction shield until December 31, 2030 or preventing the purchase of housing by funds and companies for "speculative" purposes.
On the fiscal side, the text includes raising the VAT on tourist apartments to 10%, instead of the 21% that was negotiated before the summer; "rearrange the tax situation of SOCIMIs so that they direct their investment towards affordable housing, not speculation", and establish bonuses for owners and tenants, although the minister has not detailed which ones. Regarding the latter, Moncloa's idea is to grant gradual bonuses to tenants with an income of up to 33,000 euros per year which, according to its calculations, will allow them to save a monthly payment and reach 1.6 million households.
Also from a fiscal point of view and with the objective of "protecting the public park, consolidating the Casa 47 model", the Executive proposes a reduction to 4%, that is, to the super-reduced rate, in the construction of publicly promoted housing and subsidized housing.
Rodríguez has left for the end of his presentation the measure that has raised the most controversy among the parties with which he has had to negotiate in recent hours: the extension of the current rental contracts. The minister has not gone into specifics because the text is not fully developed, which gives an idea of how complicated it has been to delve into this path. The Government has chosen to divide the measures into two decrees that it intends to take to the Congress of Ministers next Friday for validation. The tactic seeks, on the one hand, to obtain the support of PNV and Junts for most of the measures, and on the other hand, to meet the demands of its partners on the left, even symbolically, in another decree with the automatic renewal of rental contracts, whose support by the nationalist forces presents more uncertainties.
However, Isabel Rodríguez has assured that the separation has not occurred because of the origin of the demands, but because "it is the issue that has been least worked on until now with the parliamentary groups [...] We have on the one hand what has been possible to advance with the political groups and on the other what we have time to advance," she said.
Automatic extension
The automatic renewal of contracts implies the obligation for lessors to prove a justified cause for not renewing the contract and, if they do not do so, they must compensate the lessee. A compensation that the tenant unions had proposed would reach one month per year of residence in the rented home.
The Ministry of Housing had refused to include this measure in its decree, claiming that the PNV and Junts would never support it, but also considering that they cannot gauge its scope, having not been able to produce reports.
Socialist sources consulted by the Efe agency have complained in the last few hours that Sumar included this "last minute element" that "dismantled all the work of months", so the partners have finally agreed to approve two decrees.
