Congress overturns the extension of rents. Vignette of 30/04/2026 in CTXT
Translation of the cartoon: "Mission accomplished: the right-wing parties extend the gravy train"
The extraordinary extension of rents that was approved in March was repealed last Tuesday in Congress thanks to the votes against of PP, Vox and Junts and the abstention of PNV due to "legal insecurity".
The main measure that falls is the possibility of extending for up to two additional years the rental contracts for permanent housing expiring between 20 March 2026 and 31 December 2027. The measure allowed tenants to remain in the property without the need to negotiate a new contract. The extraordinary temporary limit that fixed the annual rent increase at a maximum of 2% also expires.
The Minister for Social Rights and Consumer Affairs, Pablo Bustinduy, insists that they will continue to try to recover these measures for the extension of rents:"We are not going to resign ourselves and we will bring it back as many times as necessary until it becomes a reality and the right to housing prevails". While the measures were neither radical nor a panacea, it is shameful, not surprising, that all those parties that criticise the government's inaction on housing policies have voted against the moratorium.
Now, no one knows exactly what will happen to those extensions requested by tenants from their landlords during the weeks when the decree was in force.
Housing, according to the CIS, continues to be the main problem for Spaniards. The April CIS barometer confirmed that access to housing continues to be perceived as the main problem in Spain for 41.3 % of those surveyed, followed by the economic crisis (24.9 %) and problems related to the quality of employment (19.2 %).
However, Congress does little to legislate to mitigate housing problems. During the current legislature, more than 50 related initiatives have been registered in the lower house. Slightly more than half of them, 26 are still in parliamentary procedure, 5 have already been rejected, among them the one that banned the purchase of housing by large companies.
EAPN (European Anti-Poverty and Social Exclusion Network) warns that without an extension of rents or an anti-eviction moratorium, poverty will increase and predicts that in the coming months there could be a "tsunami of evictions", due to the activation of the 70,000 paralysed evictions, plus all the invisible evictions that occur due to rents that are not covered by the extension.
EAPN research has shown that access to and maintenance of housing has become a key factor of impoverishment in Spain: four out of ten people (43.6%) living in rented housing at market rents are at risk of poverty and/or social exclusion, according to EAPN Spain's 16th State of Poverty Report.
The Sindicato de Inquilinas e Inquilinos de Madrid has already announced the first demonstration for the 24th of May in Madrid that will inaugurate "a spring of mobilisations".
