Owners and opposition revolt against Armengol’s measure: “It is worrying that they want to expropriate homes”

The Balearic Government’s decision to initiate the mandatory transfer of 56 homes belonging to large owners to be used for social rents has unleashed criticism, anger, and alerts among the owners themselves and local and national political opposition. They believe that such a measure generates legal insecurity, scares away investment, and opens the door to the “expropriation” of real estate.

The measure of the Executive led by the socialist Francina Armengol intends to make use of these 56 homes for the next seven years, based on Law 5/2018 of June 19, which allows the island government to take over the unoccupied homes that it has been registering for months in a registry of large Forks.

The announcement made yesterday has provoked, among other things, the bloc reaction of the Popular Party. Your spokesperson, Josà © Luis MartÃnez-Almeida, considers that the measure is something “deeply wrong” and “bad management”, as well as “a bad message for the future.”

His partner and vice-secretary of Sectorial of the PP, Elvira Rodríguez, has warned of the effect on investment and described it as “very worrying” that it is wanted to “expropriate the use of houses”. “If we legalize the squatting control rents and expropriate the use of homes, I don’t know how investments will come to Spain. “In these decisions,” security is lost, “he added.

For her part, the spokesperson for the Popular Group in Congress, Cuca Gamarra, has gone further in his comparison and has used the social network Twitter to launch his criticism. “Express yourself! Sánchez and Iglesias already have their partner test laboratory before taking out their Housing Law,” he wrote in a message. “Its failure in a public housing policy cannot be replaced by attacking private property. The more legal insecurity, the less investment,” he concludes.

Since association, the association that includes a good part of the Spanish Socimis, warns that Armengol’s announcement “endangers fundamental rights such as private property” and may generate “the opposite effect: create legal and institutional insecurity, scare away investors and make it more difficult to achieve the objective of creating a housing stock of sufficient quality, compatible with the environment, which meets the needs of the most vulnerable segments of the population “, in the words of Javier Basagoiti, president of the organization.

At the local level, the Balearic Association of Real Estate Services (ABSI) has warned of the legal uncertainty unleashed by the measure. In a statement collected by Europa Press, the president of the entity, Antoni GayÃ, has indicated that the Socialist Executive has implemented “the worst measure at the worst moment” (in the midst of the economic crisis generated by the pandemic) and has warned that it will reduce the investment interest of foreign capital, of great importance for an autonomous community like the Balearic Islands.

One of the most shared criticisms of initiatives of this type is their “lack of efficiency”, as pointed out by Antonio Carroza, CEO of Safe Rental. “We applaud the policies aimed at allocating public land for the construction of social housing, however, we question the efficiency of depriving legal or physical persons of the use of their properties, finding it difficult for the Administration, in the situation it is in, can guarantee the proper use of these and also face fair prices, “he points out in statements to this newspaper.

It also adds that this type of policy “will cause a restriction of the rental market, driving away landlords” and will keep investors away. “With the imminent economic crisis derived from the current pandemic, with the destruction of the business fabric and the huge increase in unemployment, it would be like bleeding a patient with a fever, we will lower the fever, but we will lose the patient”, he compares.