The Barcelona metropolitan area closed 2023 with 73,772 people registered on the official protected housing lists, a figure that concentrates a good part of the demand registered in Catalonia and that reflects the existing tension between applicants and planned supply. In the country as a whole, the registry reached 92,775 people registered during that same year.
The planned supply does not cover demand in Barcelona
The Generalitat foresees the construction of 52,626 HPO flats in the metropolitan area, a forecast that leaves a proportion of 0.71 homes per applicant. The data places Barcelona and its metropolitan area as the main pressure point of the system, with coverage clearly inferior to the accumulated demand.
The contrast is notable if compared with other territorial areas of Catalonia. The proportion of homes planned per applicant rises to 17.98 in Alt Pirineu i Aran, 21.08 in Ponent and 27.05 in Terres de l'Ebre, well above the metropolitan ratio.
A accumulated deficit of 93,000 homes
The register of applicants for official protected housing presents an accumulated deficit of 93,000 households at the end of 2023. That gap occurs in a context of a sharp decline in the production of this type of housing during the last decade.
In Catalonia, the construction of HPO went from an average of 5,000 flats annually between 2003 and 2012 to an average of 1,196 flats annually in the last ten years. For Miquel Morell, vice-president of the Territorial and Urban Economy Commission of the College of Economists of Catalonia and partner at Promo Assessors Consultors, the decline has a main cause.
"The State's policy on the financing of protected housing that had been the backbone of housing policies of the previous 30 years ends" - Miquel Morell, Colegio de Economistas de Cataluña
The Generalitat projects 210,736 flats in Catalonia
According to 2024 data, the Generalitat has planned 210,736 HPO flats in Catalonia. The figure marks the volume of protected housing contemplated at a Catalan scale, although the territorial imbalance between demand and supply remains especially visible in the Barcelona area.
Morell maintains that the current pace is insufficient to correct the situation and proposes a change of scale in production.
"We need to produce an average of between 20,000 and 21,000 subsidized homes per year between 2023 and 2037" - Miquel Morell, College of Economists of Catalonia
In parallel, Xavier Vilajoana, president of the Association of Developers and Builders of Buildings of Catalonia, underscores the social scope of this residential park.
"The officially protected housing units are intended for 80 % of the population of this country" - Xavier Vilajoana, APCE
Morell adds that subsidized housing is currently responding to a middle segment of the population, a change that places the debate not only on the lack of supply, but also on the growing profile of households that resort to this market to be able to access housing.