Spain’s housing crisis explodes

First published at Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung.

In Madrid the political landscape has been turned on its head. Public outrage over the attempted eviction of a 87-year-old woman in Madrid from the apartment she had lived in since 1953 brought tens of thousands of people across Spain to the streets demanding measures to alleviate rising rent.

The Sindicato de Inquilinas de Madrid, the Madrid Tenants’ Union, coming off an international housing right’s congress held in Madrid just the week before the headline grabbing eviction, played its cards skillfully, mounting a series of direct actions and clear demands over the course of five days that succeeded in forcing the government to pay attention.

On 5 October, Pedro Sánchez, with no credible candidate to his left, announced an early general election in a bid to capitalize on the public outcry, which reframed the political discussion previously dominated by an ascendant right.

Meanwhile, Spain’s tenants’ rights movement, the Confederation of Tenants’ Unions of Spain, and various left-wing organizations are scaling up their protests after parliament rejected the government's attempt to pass legislation to alleviate Spain’s housing crisis.

A rental freeze and an end to evictions?

The bill had been proposed by the Social Democrats in the PSOE-Sumar coalition government. A watered-down version of a proposal put forward by tenants' unions, the bill was dubbed Decreto Maricarmen, Maricarmen's Law, in honour of the elderly woman who had been evicted by Urbagestión, a vulture fund of property speculators just days before, on 23 September.

Maricarmen’s Law comprised a package of four urgent measures. These included a freeze on rent prices for the duration of the housing emergency, and regulation of seasonal leases and renting by room — referred to as ‘anti-scam measures’, as many landlords use these tactics to circumvent housing legislation, shorten leases, and raise prices in high-demand areas.

The bill also proposed a ban on evictions without the provision of alternative accommodation, for which public authorities would be responsible, as well as the automatic renewal of leases beyond the current five-year limit. In other words, landlords would not be able to evict tenants or increase rents without a justified reason.

From the perspective of the Confederation of Tenants’ Unions, these demands represent a starting point. They are limited measures, however, as they fail to address fundamental issues such as the recovery of social housing sold to investment funds in 2008.

Nor would they have established effective control or reduce rents, which would do something to help alleviate the hardship currently experienced by a large proportion of the population. However, the measures would serve to reduce some of the damage. In particular, the indefinite renewal of rental agreements would put a stop to future speculation.

From activist congress to national movement

The unplanned sit-in at Puerta del Sol had been preceded by a wave of protests that week. After four years in Barcelona, The District, southern Europe’s largest international property fair, was held in Madrid for the first time between 22 and 24 September, drawn there by neoliberal Madrid governor Isabel Díaz Ayuso.

In response, the Madrid Tenants’ Union and the European Action Coalition for the Right to Housing and the City (EAC) organized the international counter-summit EL BARRIO. The event condemned the use of housing as financial assets and championed the right to housing. EL BARRIO brought together over 70 groups from more than 20 countries worldwide, as well as 160 observers and housing activists from outside the local context.

The housing movement, along with other anti-fascist, climate and left-wing groups, organized three instances of direct action at the property fair The District’s event. They blocked the venue’s main access road, blocked the rear entrance from the inside, and disrupted Isabel Díaz Ayuso’s welcome speech to investors who had just arrived in Madrid intent on dividing up what remains of the city as though it were a Monopoly board.

Just hours later, the Madrid Tenants’ Union led an event in support of Maricarmen, with speeches and performances by Spanish celebrities, such as Ana Belén, Juan Diego Botto, Marwan, Eddi Circa, Rozalén and Inés Hernand. The event brought Maricarmen and her situation into the public debate, challenging the dominant narrative.

That very night, there was a call for those willing to resist the eviction to set up camp outside the property. Around 150 people gathered and some fifty tents were pitched outside number 46 Calle Alcalde Sáinz de Baranda.

This is a street in a central neighbourhood, next to Madrid’s Retiro Park. In 2025, there were more than 24,500 evictions in Spain. Seventy-five percent of these involved rented properties, but incidents of resistance against evictions are usually seen in working-class neighbourhoods.

The El Barrio counter summit

Maricarmen’s story debunks some of the rhetoric employed by the far-right in Europe. In this case, the person facing eviction was a 87-year-old white Spanish woman. She is a former employee, now a pensioner, who had never failed to pay her rent or fulfil her obligations under the system. She could be the mother or grandmother of many far-right supporters.

The night passed without incident until, after hours of peaceful resistance and following the use of tear gas inside the building by the National Police, the court-appointed agents succeeded in carrying out the eviction in front of the eyes of numerous international groups who had come to Madrid for the EL BARRIO counter-summit.

Following the eviction, Maricarmen had to be taken straight to hospital. A picture of Maricarmen,distraught, wheeled out of the building on a stretcher, went viral across the world.

From that moment on, the protest snowballed. Isabel Díaz Ayuso’s cruel remarks in response to the images added to the outrage she had provoked in recent weeks by spending more than €6 million of public money on a penthouse destined for use as a personal residence.

On the afternoon of 23 September, a rally was organized outside the ‘Ayuso Penthouse’ to demonstrate against Maricarmen’s eviction. The protest spilled out from the designated area, culminating in a police charge after demonstrators blocked the Paseo de la Castellana, one of the capital’s main thoroughfares.

A day later, the International Counter-Summit EL BARRIO began. Their presence in Madrid helped to raise international awareness of the dispute. Against this backdrop, the Union decided to change the summit’s agenda and organize a demonstration for Saturday 26 September, with a powerful message: “Ni una Maricarmen más” (“Not one more Maricarmen.”)

The demonstration was a resounding success. The turnout of nearly half a million people exceeded all expectations and culminated in a camp set up in Puerta del Sol with a very clear demand: pass the Maricarmen Law.

The legislation was not passed, but, given the enormous repercussions and the serious reputational damage to Urbagestión following Maricarmen’s eviction, after years of refusing to sit down to negotiate, the vulture fund agreed to allow her to return home under the original terms. Although this only solves one individual case, the struggle and process that led to this outcome are what make the case so significant and illuminate the way forward, while parliamentary politics drags its feet.

Weak response by government

After months of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez cultivating a profile on the international stage as a beacon of the left, observers outside the Spanish State cannot understand why he is finding it so difficult to pass four basic measures to protect citizens from speculation.

Certainly, he is facing difficulties caused by the balance of power in parliament, but the lack of political will is plain to see, despite the Spanish Government currently being made up of 23 ministers, who are also elected members of parliament, of which five belong to left-wing electoral alliance Sumar.

To understand Sánchez’s move, it is important to understand how the Spanish legislature works, particularly the concept of the royal decree-law.

The royal decree-law is a legislative instrument with the force of law that the Spanish government can adopt in response to an extraordinary and urgent situation, bypassing the usual parliamentary procedure. It comes into force on the day of its publication in the Official State Gazette but initially has only provisional validity. The Congress of Deputies then has 30 days to ratify or reject it. If it is rejected or not ratified in time, it ceases to be in force.

Instead of putting forward the version of Maricarmen’s Law proposed by the Tenants’ Union, Spain’s Council of Ministers moved forward with two different bills.

The first included a set of unambitious measures, which in any case would have expired in 2028 or 2030, and tax breaks for landlords.

The second provided for the automatic renewal of tenancy leases, which the Union had identified as the most important measure.

This sparked mistrust among both social movements and the left-wing party Podemos, who suspected that the second bill was intended to fail. The view on the streets, however, was clear. The proposed laws, despite being a far cry from a definitive solution, did offer some respite for thousands of people. Podemos, having initially wavered in their position, bowed to popular demand and announced they would back the bill the day before the vote.

Unsurprisingly, the right-wing Partido Popular, the People’s Party, and the far-right VOX voted against the bill.

A left wing government dependent on minority support

What complicates the situation in the Spanish parliament is that the progressive PSOE-Sumar coalition government is propped up by eight smaller parties. Two of these hold enough seats in Parliament to tip the balance of the vote. These are the Basque Nationalist Party (PNV), with 5 seats and Junts per Catalunya, with 7. The PNV and Junts are conservative nationalists representing, respectively, the Basque and the Catalan bourgeoisie.

The five MPs from the PNV voted in favour of the first bill and against the second.

For its part, Junts announced almost a year ago that it would block any parliamentary bill put forward by this government, as it was not complying with the agreements made when they first formed the current coalition. These agreements include the amnesty law, which would allow Carles Puigdemont, the leader of Junts, to return from exile in Belgium. He has been there since 2017 when he was removed as president of the Generalitat, the Catalan autonomous government, following Catalonia’s unilateral declaration of independence.

In the face of so much public pressure, the seven Junts MPs, whose support was needed to push through the housing bills, agreed to negotiate, but ultimately voted against both bills. It is also worth mentioning that three of these MPs own rental properties, and one is a property developer.

Landlords in parliament

In fact, 86 percent of all MPs in the current parliament own one or more residential properties. Almost 20 percent supplement their salaries with income from letting and property speculation. Seventeen PSOE MPs, including the Prime Minister, and the Minister for Housing, are landlords. Furthermore, several former senior PSOE officials have gone on to work for property companies or speculative property agencies.

This would go some way towards explaining why Parliament has voted against a law which, in the words of Alicia del Río, spokesperson for the Tenants’ Union, “ protects not only the right to housing, but also the right to health, education and life”. Del Río is referring to the problems faced by children who have had to change schools because they have been forced out of their neighbourhoods, as well as to mental health issues, and the numerous suicides which have been linked to evictions.

According to the Tenants’ Union, the Spanish State has a: “ Parliament purely driven by profit, which defends speculation over human life. And — even more serious — a Parliament that is irreparably distancing itself from its people.”

The Tenants’ Union has called attention to a significant discrepancy between the views of the general public, 68 per cent of whom support rent controls, and those of their parliament. For this reason, the Tenants’ Union is committed to continuing to translate the public discontent on this issue into real legislative improvements through organization. What is more, they are clear about the means to achieve this: a general strike for the right to housing and against the cost-of-living crisis.

Sánchez making a virtue out of necessity

This is not the first time that Pedro Sánchez has used a political storm to his advantage. Following the failure of the two royal decree housing bills, the leader of the PSOE is opening the door to an early election. While the circumstances can hardly be called favourable, they are certainly less challenging than two weeks ago, and it may well be the best possible moment in the coming months.

Before the sit-in at Plaza del Sol began, Sánchez presided over a paralyzed parliament, an international crisis in Ceuta, and a far-right takeover in the streets. Following Maricarmen’s eviction, Sanchez now has a campaign focus and can blame Junts for his failure to bring in a single measure to alleviate the housing crisis in his eight years in government.

On a broader scale, the Tenants’ Union appears to have sparked a new cycle of left-wing protests capable of shifting the Overton window of mainstream political discourse.

However, the climate of tension and fragmentation within the political Left is currently preventing this discontent from being channeled into electoral politics. Still mired in disputes over power and ego, the institutional Left has been unable to articulate a compelling alternative that can win over a large section of left-wing voters, leaving them without an option they can identify with.

Sánchez is looking to win those voters over by championing left-wing issues, but after two terms as prime minister, it is clear he lacks the resolve to pass legislation to protect the right to housing from market forces.

María del Vigo works as a project manager and communications officer at the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation’s Madrid Office.

Miriam Bue is spokesperson for Madrid' tenants union, where she is also in charge of international relations.