BarcelonaNew data on the housing crisis and the insecurity of renting. 64.8% of tenants in Barcelona, almost two out of three, allocate more than 30% of their income to pay rent and supplies, a percentage that in the case of Madrid rises to 69.7%.
This is the conclusion of a study by the Institut de Recerca Urbana de Barcelona (IDRA), which adds that one in three households – and around half of people who live alone – spend more than 50% of their income on rent . As a result, according to the study, half of the tenants are left “in a situation of serious relative poverty after paying the rent”, with less than 561 euros per month per consumption unit.
IDRA, which has carried out the study in Barcelona based on a thousand cases between October and December 2022 and in Madrid in the same months but from 2023, assures that the current situation of the rental market in Spain is characterized by the “residential insecurity”. Among others, due to the proliferation of seasonal rentals, which until the middle of this year has increased the offer by 55%.
The Institute points out that the situation in Spain is different from that of other European countries, such as France, Germany and the Netherlands, where indefinite rent has been “the norm for decades”. That’s why it calls for an end to temporary work with the implementation of indefinite contracts and for the regulation of rental prices to be “effective”.
Until then, the study determines that 47% of households do not have the certainty of being able to continue living in the same home in the following six months. And he points out, in fact, that 80% of Barcelona residents have changed flats in the last five years, in many cases forced due to unaffordable increases in rent or non-renewal of contracts. Four out of ten have made two or more transfers during this period.
The study still leaves another relevant figure: 9.4% of tenants in Barcelona do not have a contract or have a verbal agreement, and of these, more than half (58.3%) are in the market rooms
