Barcelona prepares to bring in tougher rent controls

After seeing housing costs jump by more than 50% in the past five years, officials in Barcelona are moving to introduce Spain’s most aggressive rent controls.

Under a decree published last week, landlords will have to negotiate leases based on benchmark prices set for each property in those neighbourhoods tagged as most desirable.

That regulation follows a national law implemented in March that caps annual rent hikes at the rate of inflation, currently 1.5%.

Spain’s hottest property markets — Madrid, Barcelona, the Basque region, and Valencia — have attracted money from foreign investors such as Blackstone Group and Cerberus in recent years just as thousands of landlords converted year-around flats to tourist apartments. Progressive parties that have taken control of city halls blame the foreigners for much of the rent increases.

One note of caution: Pro-renter Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau lost in Sunday’s election. While the winner from the Esquerra Republicana party also supports rent controls, it won’t be known until around the middle of June whether the new mayor has enough allies in smaller parties to carry them out.

The rules were written by the government of Catalonia and allow similar controls in the region’s smaller towns. But few may embrace the measures equally, as the increases have been largely confined to the biggest cities, said Mark Stucklin, a real estate analyst with Spanish Property Insight in Barcelona.

He said:

I expect this to happen here first

Similar measures are possible in a handful of larger cities in Catalonia such as Tarragona and Girona, “but few other towns”, he said. Most rural areas and smaller cities have yet to fully recover from the property crash of 2008-13. Nationwide, rents rose 2.3% over the last five years, versus inflation of 3.4%.

“Only the two biggest cities, Madrid and Barcelona, have recovered to pre-crisis levels,” said Pablo Fernandez de Mosteyrin, a real-estate analyst with Renta 4 Banco in Madrid. “That’s where the price pressure is.”

Catalonia’s new rules make exceptions for new construction and higher-end apartments — those with amenities such as swimming pools and gardens. The combined listings of Airbnb and HomeAway-Vrbo in Barcelona have grown over the years to about 20,000 last month. Website Fotocasa says it’s not that simple.

While growing numbers of landlords are clearly letting their apartments to tourists, banks have also been stingier since the crisis, driving up rents as potential buyers end up in the rental market.

Bloomberg