The Ministry of Housing publishes the reference price index that will allow limiting rents in stressed areas

The Ministry of Housing published this Tuesday the reference index that will allow limiting the rental price in stressed areas. The indicator, provided for in the housing law approved in the last legislature, contemplates a maximum and minimum range of prices depending on the area and the characteristics of each home, a range that may be taken into account when signing new housing contracts. rent. The system does not convince Catalonia. The community chaired by ERC is the only one that at the moment intends to implement the stressed areas to limit the price of rentals. Sumar and Podemos are also suspicious of the new instrument.

Starting this Tuesday, anyone can check the reference price of the apartment in which they live or any other home on the Ministry of Housing website, by entering the address in a search engine enabled for this purpose at this link.. These prices have been calculated from the income tax return data of 2.5 million landlords and are the result of the joint work of the Ministries of Housing and Finance, the Cadastre, the INE, the Bank of Spain and the College of Registrars, as explained in a press conference by the Secretary of State for Housing and Urban Agenda, David Lucas.

The reference price system sets a range in which rents should fluctuate, depending on the location, surface area and characteristics of the home (the state of conservation, the energy certificate, the year of construction, whether it has an elevator, parking, community areas, concierge…). The Secretary of State has stressed that this index reflects the prices paid in the market, an amount that is often “far below” what is requested, which is intended to avoid speculation.

For example, on real estate portals you can find an advertisement in which an apartment of 70 square meters and two bedrooms is offered for 2,600 euros per month, located near the central Retiro Park in Madrid, on a fourth floor with an elevator.. That same home should be rented for between 1,030 and 1,332 euros, according to the ministry's index. In this way, the new tool helps tenants know how much they pay for apartments of certain characteristics in specific areas and thus know if they are asked for an amount that is too high when signing a rental contract.

Operational in stressed areas

However, the index is not merely informative.. In those areas that are declared stressed areas, the range calculated by the new system must be taken as a reference when determining the amount of the new rental contracts when the home is owned by a large holder – who has ten or more homes or, if This is established by the autonomous community, five in the same stressed area – or rented for the first time in five years, as long as they are located in a stressed area area.. To receive this consideration, it is the regional governments who have to request it and present the relevant documentation to the ministry.

For the moment, only Catalonia has submitted to the ministry the report required to declare a tense zone in its territory that will affect 140 municipalities, according to the calculations of the Generalitat.. However, some of the details of said plan are still pending to be resolved, which includes measures to be adopted over the next few years to 'relax' the price of rentals in these areas.. The declaration of stressed zone also activates the price paid by the previous tenant as a reference for new contracts.. In the case of apartments in the hands of large holders, the most positive reference is applied.

Once the document presented by the Generalitat receives final approval and is published in the Official State Gazette, price control can begin to be applied to new rental contracts in those 140 municipalities based on the index published this Tuesday.. In any case, we will have to wait until March 13 for the new tool to begin to be applied – when it will be published in the BOE – and it will not operate on current contracts. “We have tried to guarantee legal security,” Lucas stressed.

The reference price index, which the Ministry of Housing had promised to have ready “yes or yes” in February, includes data from the 2022 income tax return.. The Secretary of State has pointed out that the 2023 data will be available before the end of the year and has confirmed that the system will be updated annually.. The indicator is not yet available for the Basque Country and Navarra, because these communities have a different tax regime and the Tax Agency does not have the necessary information, although Lucas has assured that “work is being done” to develop the new system in both. territories.

In fact, according to the Secretary of State, the community chaired by María Chivite has already “verbally” communicated to the ministry its willingness to decree tension zones, as has Asturias, although neither of the two has yet presented the required documentation. “I invite other communities to declare tense areas,” he urged.. Housing Sources trust that making this price reference system available to citizens will encourage more regions to request the declaration of a stressed area.

The publication of the index this Tuesday comes a day after the Minister of Territory of the Generalitat, Ester Capella, showed her disagreement with the new indicator after meeting this Monday with the Minister of Housing. The Catalan official criticized the model designed at the national level for establishing a minimum and maximum range of prices, instead of a fixed price, pointing out that “it will not make prices go down, because they will always go to the highest price range.”

Along the same lines, the deputy spokesperson for Sumar in Congress, Aina Vidal, and the spokesperson for Podemos in the Lower House, Javier Sánchez Serna, have also expressed their doubts about the rental price index.. Vidal has explained his reluctance about the maximum and minimum price ranges that he establishes. “They are so broad that they would only reduce the most extreme and most abusive prices,” he warned. For its part, Serna has requested that the meter limit the maximum and minimum price ranges so that “significant” drops can be carried out.