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Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

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Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#281

Post by misja111 »

nephanth wrote: post #106

I mean from a justice standpoint, squatting is wrong But from a societal standpoint, the laws being this way have a bunch of positive externalities 1. It provides shelter to the homeless, with all the advantages we know that has 2. It provides an incentive to not leave property vacant. Very important in a country with high vacancy rates 1nd a hiusing crisis. Note also that this is done at the expense of investors. Wh…

I lived in Amsterdam for a long time, and the Dutch government initially took a very liberal stance on squatting exactly for the reasons you mentioned. And initially it seemed to work, the squatters were a mix of idealists, artists and others, otoh property owners tried to find creative ways to make sure their properties didn't stay inhabited for too long, e.g. by renting it out temporarily.

However after some years, the situation slowly changed: more and more squatters were drug addicts, who ofc couldn't afford to pay rent; also the word spread outside of NL that it was possible to go to Amsterdam and live there for free, so loads of immigrants came with no intention to rent at all.

Apart from that, squatting exposed another problem: the squatters typically didn't care too much about their home or neighbourhood, after all it was not theirs and sooner or later they'd have to move out again. So they typically caused a lot of irritation with their neighbours because of garbage of noise. In the end, squatters in NL lost most of the goodwill they had with the Dutch government, and stricter anti squatting laws are now in place.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#282

Post by quectophoton »

littlestymaar wrote: post #279
quectophoton wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a property is fully decorated (photos of my family, toothbrush I've used, etc), is that still considered empty? If the answer is "yes", then based on your post, the answer to my question of how long can I take a vacation for, is "decades". But if that is indeed considered empty, then what if in addition to that, every month I email someone my travel expenses and tell them to print them and to put them in some draw…

It's funny because most of your argument assumes setting some kind of threshold would be a problem, as if it was not exactly how fiscal rules worked already. For instance, you are paying income taxes in your “country of residence” and not in your country of vacations (unless you are an American citizen living abroad, in which case you pay it to both your country of residence and to the US), and there is a threshold t…

Yeah I'm dumb when it comes to legal stuff, but my guess is that defining a threshold with a good balance while also not inconveniencing the common citizen wouldn't be as easy as it might first appear, at least without causing some unintended consequences that people might not think about when proposing "'just' do X".

But like I said, I'm dumb when it comes to this topic.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#283

Post by kgwgk »

ricardobayes wrote: post #247
otherme123 wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First, I think okupas are a very small problem, mainly used for propaganda. But how are real state companies feeding the problem? The problem is that there's no houses available, because politicians create artificial scarcity. In any local government, the stronger department is "Urbanism", decides if you get rich by allowing you to develop on your property, or you stay poor because you don't get the permits. Come on,…

It partially boils down to Spain having very little new construction. In a little eastern european country with 10 million people like Hungary there are roughly just as many new developments on the market as in a big country like Spain, with 40M population. Hungary: more than 2k new houses, and there are more than 5k new apartments to buy. https://ingatlan.com/lista/elado+haz+uj-epitesu In Madrid province, there are…

> In Madrid province, there are around 700 new houses+apartments to buy

There are many more. That link shows 700 developments, most of them with multiple units on offer.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#284

Post by dr__mario »

rudnevr wrote: post #264

I live in Spain and own property in Spain. There's clearly a gap between imaginary noble okupas addressing housing crisis via occupation of unused bank property and reality of weed smoking anarchists and their collaborating deoccupying mafia harassing mostly not-so-rich middle class, who can't afford the security measures the rich can. It's not a small problem, there's like 12K cases per year last time I checked. Eve…

Can you define that "middle-class", please? If you live purely from housing, you are not middle-class.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#285

Post by kgwgk »

dr__mario wrote: post #284
rudnevr wrote: post #264

I live in Spain and own property in Spain. There's clearly a gap between imaginary noble okupas addressing housing crisis via occupation of unused bank property and reality of weed smoking anarchists and their collaborating deoccupying mafia harassing mostly not-so-rich middle class, who can't afford the security measures the rich can. It's not a small problem, there's like 12K cases per year last time I checked. Eve…

Can you define that "middle-class", please? If you live purely from housing, you are not middle-class.

What makes you think that the problem concerns mainly - let alone only - people who live purely from housing?

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#286

Post by [deleted] »

pnut wrote: post #195
ssijak wrote: post #33

This is pure madness. So you have 48 hours after squatting started to report it and potentially get a fast eviction (why is it not an automatic criminal case for breaking into the property is beyond me). But after 48 hours it seems like it becomes a nightmare. So if you are on a business trip for 3 days or visiting parents in a different city or vacationing for a few days and somebody enters your home, you are out of…

I don't get it. You have keys to the place. There's no written contract, no money changing hands. Show up with some muscle, chuck the losers out on the street and change the locks. What are they going to do, take you to court?

[deleted]

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#287

Post by galangalalgol »

terminalcommand wrote: post #270
UweSchmidt wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having a building vacant is already incredibly expensive; costs and interest add up and the building can get severely damaged (a building has to be heated in winter, ventilated properly and issues like broken pipes have to be found quickly by tenants etc.). Common reasons for vacancies are probate disputes, owners that are house rich but cash poor and can't handle maintenance, issues with building code and permits an…

In countries with high inflation purchasing real-estate and keeping it vacant is an inflation hedge. Plus, you also benefit from low interest rates and get free money if your government allows it. I live in Turkey. We had 80% p.a. inflation, where the government decided to lower the interest rates even further. Our president said Interest rates are the cause of inflation and if we lowered interest rates inflation wou…

I live somewhere with ~3% property taxes on properties, including the one you reside in. Not so long ago mortgages were cheaper than that, and mortgages at least end someday. At the same time, short term rentals like airbnb are illegal. Combined, this leads to most landlords either being companies large enough to keep extremely high occupancy rates, or families that flout the law to rent a second property owned due to marriage or inheritance and become vulnerable the whims of neighbors.

I think allowing short term rentals, and giving owners strong eviction rights for damage, illegal activity or non-payment (which we have) need to be paired with property taxes to prevent all landlords becoming large inhuman entities.

It should also be noted that if you tax everything at the value it could make, you distort the usage of valuable locations to exclude housing.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#288

Post by miguelxt »

hichamdoe wrote: post #47

This is bullshit. I'm dev from Barcelona (Catalonia, Spain) and the squatting topic is periodically being pumped up by the same dumb bastards (always the same companies and media). Squatting exists at the city but it is not an issue in the daily lifes of Barcelona and Spain citizens, only for the fucking big owners with more than 10 flats each. Squatting happens because this bastards (big owners) are inflating the fl…

Homicide is also NOT an issue in the daily life Spanish citizens, that doesn't prevent it from being a big problem for anyone who suffers the problem.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#289

Post by rudnevr »

pimterry wrote: post #277
rudnevr wrote: post #264

I live in Spain and own property in Spain. There's clearly a gap between imaginary noble okupas addressing housing crisis via occupation of unused bank property and reality of weed smoking anarchists and their collaborating deoccupying mafia harassing mostly not-so-rich middle class, who can't afford the security measures the rich can. It's not a small problem, there's like 12K cases per year last time I checked. Eve…

> It's not a small problem, there's like 12K cases per year last time I checked. https://maldita.es/malditateexplica/20221026/datos-okupacion... has the actual data (in Spanish): * 10-17k cases of occupation annually (rising until 2021, but down in 2022 and further down in 2023: https://www.cronista.com/espana/actualidad-es/adios-okupas-c... ) * Of those ~15k, 5% are actually occupation of somebody's residence (allan…

Thanks for the info. It's not that widespread, yes, but due to its gravity it's intoxicating and polarizing the public.

From what I observe, the amount of cases could have dropped down because many people choose to not buy or somehow shield their property (sometimes just filling windows with bricks, for example, which looks weird). So I'm not sure it's because the okupas/govt/police somehow changed the direction, it's just like the people get better at protecting themselves.

Btw, bying an apartment in Barcelona costs you 10% tax already, that probably discourages most speculation (and the prices have been stagnant for a couple of years).

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#290

Post by kgwgk »

pas wrote: post #240
AlunAlun wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, we can’t explicitly establish that. It is of course true that many squatters do so out of financial necessity, but others do so for other reasons: a lifestyle choice, a political choice, or plain freeloading and financial gain - in a squat in my village there were people living there with full time jobs and driving brand new Audis! I would add further that the responsibility of paying the utilities and tax falls…

Ah, the squatters with Audis sounds newsworthy, is it something like this https://www.elmundo.es/madrid/2023/02/23/63f66cacfdddffa0b48... ?

Another BMW-driving serial squatter (having a secondary residence for the weekend is also a human right):

https://www.elespanol.com/reportajes/20240528/maria-okupa-be...

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