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

idealista.com

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

#891

Post by lottin »

tomjakubowski wrote: post #710
lottin wrote: post #523

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I understand that selling a rented property can be less profitable than selling a property without a rent contract. But holding on to a property that generates no income is even less profitable.

On an abandoned property, the land may appreciate faster than the improvements depreciate. As long as that pace exceeds the mortgage interest (if any) and property tax (ibid), it's profitable. There are other possible complications too which might swing it, like income tax deductions. Sometimes seemingly abandoned buildings are used for one-off occasions which generate income: downtown LA is full of "historic" buildi…

Sorry, but I fail to see how owning an abandoned building is MORE profitable than having people living there and collecting rent on it, even if that means that you have to spend part of that income on maintenance costs.

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

#892

Post by BrandoElFollito »

We have exactly the same problem in France.

This leads people to hate squatters because the visible ones are the ones who will steal property and then it takes agreed to get rid of them. You never know about the ones who squatt abandoned buildings or the points nobody cares about.

On top of that you have active and noisy associations that help them so this raises the hatred even more.

You must not get rid of them by force because of the law. I have a friend of a friend who decided to come in force, there were 10 of them and just squatted the squatters making their life unbearable (including destroying their property, "by mistake") They left after a few days and went to the police to complain.

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

#893

Post by zrn900 »

yazzku wrote: post #881
zrn900 wrote: post #715

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People dont like to be the gentrifier. In digital nomad forums or 'investment' forums the reaction to any news about gentrification is the same - downvoting, denial, blaming someone else. Most blame the locals for letting it happen. Some more educated try to blame 'the corrupt politicians' (whatever the f that means, they plug it everywhere as if its applicable), others blame the 'real estate sellers'. They want to b…

I read through your other comments and don't exactly agree with many of your points, which appear to be pro-squatting? But you certainly seem to have a good handle on the problems. Is there a way we can connect outside of HN? Not really sure how to PM somebody here or if it's even possible.

> which appear to be pro-squatting?

As the constitutional right to housing is being basically circumvented through just not protecting that right, yeah, squatting seems to be the best way to protect that right.

I have a good handle of problems regarding this, and a lot of other things, however I unfortunately don't have the time to take action on any of them. So, sorry, I wouldn't be able to get in contact or do anything else.

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

#894

Post by zrn900 »

nec4b wrote: post #851
zrn900 wrote: post #688

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only. Spain declared all Native Americans Spanish subjects with equal rights in 1519. Then they proceeded to hang in public any governor who violated those rights. That's why there are 7 million 'pure blooded' (whatever that means) Native Americans in South America today and there are races like Mexican. What's more, Spain treated the 'colonies' as parts of Spain and it spent all its money developing them. From th…

I see and the tons of gold they brought back to Spain was given freely by the natives, starting with Hernán Cortés (conquered Aztecs)?

Part of it was, most of it wasn't. And its really not relevant: Tons of gold and economic value that was extracted from the local Spaniards, local French, local English, local Germanics weren't given to their feudal lords voluntarily either. It was the political setup of its time. As a result, proposing something like this based on the standards of today sounds at best hypocrisy, at worst, dumb.

The native Americans became Spanish subjects in 1519. With all the good things and the bad things that being the subject of an average European feudal kingdom brought along with it.

Nobody declared them 'non-human' and started eradicating them like the English did. That's what you should be being cynical and sarcastic about.

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

#895

Post by zrn900 »

nerdawson wrote: post #760
taopai wrote: post #750

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- Have you worked there with the average salary? - Have you met the reality of working class people there? - Have you stayed on a touristic city or on industrial areas? - The real criminals are people from Spain, speculative funds and tourists from all over the world buying property here and not using it. They steal to everybody. Then we can't hire people for our business because people can't find rent. We aren't pay…

> - The real criminals are people from Spain, speculative funds and tourists from all over the world buying property here and not using it. They steal to everybody. So create a tax for leaving property empty and use that to fund programs to address homelessness. There are plenty of solutions which aren’t permitting theft. Banning short term rentals for instance would be pretty effective. There could be other side eff…

> There are plenty of solutions which aren’t permitting theft.

There are 'plenty of solutions' which arent permitting theft, and NONE of them work ANYWHERE. The only solution is, well, 'theft', apparently.

> My assumption would be that imposing punitive taxes on unoccupied properties is the most realistic solution.

Another case of just shooting from the hip without knowing anything. There is already a tax on unoccupied properties. It didn't fix anything.

> If that forces people to sell, supply goes up. If people continue as they were, there’s more money available to do something with.

Another example of economic 'theorization' based on the reality of... nothing. The tax is there, it doesn't work. The economic theory has little connection with the actual reality in Spain too, just like elsewhere in the world. Its just a modern religion to justify capitalist profiteering based on 'how things should be'. Except things just don't work the way they 'should'...

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

#896

Post by ekianjo »

Malcolmlisk wrote: post #175
ekianjo wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

The government literally tells you what to eat and wear. And thank god... since without those laws we would eat the worst and toxic foods and wear toxic and low quality clothes.

you know that the whole food pyramid stuff thaught in school by the authorities for years was pure bullshit right?

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

#897

Post by lottin »

nephanth wrote: post #864
lottin wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If investing in housing is made less profitable, there will be less investing and consequently less supply in the long run, thus making the housing problem worse.

Except in this case, what is less profitable is investing in land/infrastructure that could serve as housing but leaving it vacant. That is not investment in housing, simply speculation on land and buildings. Investment in housing (ie actively rented places) are unaffected, so there is no reason there woukd be less investing on that front

That's not how businesses work. Nobody spends millions building a house so that they can leave it vacant once it's finished.

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

#898

Post by kjkjadksj »

zxspectrum1982 wrote: post #861
jjav wrote: post #846

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the squatter is allowed to break in while you're not home and change the locks, why can't the owner wait for them to be out and also break in and change the locks? Does the law specifically say that breaking in is allowed by anyone except the legitimate owner?

Essentially, yes, that's how stupid law is in Spain. But if a third squatter would break in, they'd be safe. See eg https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.antena3.com/programas/espej...

Seems there might be a business opportunity in a “third squatter for hire” business.

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

#899

Post by nephanth »

lottin wrote: post #897
nephanth wrote: post #864

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except in this case, what is less profitable is investing in land/infrastructure that could serve as housing but leaving it vacant. That is not investment in housing, simply speculation on land and buildings. Investment in housing (ie actively rented places) are unaffected, so there is no reason there woukd be less investing on that front

That's not how businesses work. Nobody spends millions building a house so that they can leave it vacant once it's finished.

Except they do. That is the problem.

See for example:

https://m.murciatoday.com/almost_half_a_million_vacant_new_b...

https://www.investigate-europe.eu/en/posts/the-empty-house-a...

It isn't a particularly Spanish problem either: following article about the American version of it

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/empty-office-buildings-doom-loo...

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

#900

Post by hnbad »

Wytwwww wrote: post #889
hnbad wrote: post #755

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was talking about the website the article is on, not HN. I'm well aware that HN is run by Y Combinator. It's in the URL. That said, squatting unused housing is literally "disrupting the housing market" by eliminating the waste of critical resources. It's upsetting the market and breaking established rules, sure, but so are AirBnB, Uber, generative AI and cryptocurrencies. If you think about the founding mythology o…

> I was talking about the website the article is on, It's website of the biggest(?) real estate classifieds website in Spain so it's not particularly shocking.

Yes, and I didn't know that because I don't live in Spain nor trade in Spanish real estate.
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