Ada Colau closes with illegal apartments: put order or will draw slice? – Yahoo Finance Spain

Ada Colau team in front of the City of Barcelona is not to : after starting a campaign of inspections and fines up 90,000 euros to illegal tourist apartments, has decoupled with the idea of ​​reducing the penalty to the owners to cede these homes for social rent.

The idea is to write off up to 80% of the sanction to owners who collaborate in this initiative and, in parallel, offer rental housing to families in a difficult economic situation at an affordable price. The remaining 20% ​​of the fine will be paid. So far, a measure with a social component, in line with a mayor who came into the public sphere for defending the homeless through the Platform of People Affected by the Mortgage and in his first day as mayor of Barcelona, nine evictions stopped.

The offer fined the owners of illegal apartments which would be launched in September as a pilot project Ciutat Vella -has sold to neighbors as a solution to combat tourism low quality in the Catalan capital and reduce its negative impact on the district. The opposition has already warned that it will not be easy and accuse him of combating illegal floors with ‘smoke’ and ‘blackmail’ owners.

The ‘buts’ arise after the corner. First because it will be the Barcelona city council who rent copper, so that the owners pay part of the fine will be saved but will not see one euro of income. So the mayor will charge for rent something that is not theirs.

Second because the owners accept the agreement agree to donate the house to the city council for a period of three years. This means you can not legally dispose of it for rent, to occupy them or their children or to sell if necessary.

Also, keep in mind that the majority of fines are 15,000 euros, in the lower range who would you be interested cede his apartment for three years the council to change avoided a fine of 12,000 (80% of the total) if renting it as surely earn more house

[ Also of interest: Slap Ada Colau to power almighty: be just the 'bargain', begins the war ]

Only in the Eixample, the number of houses for tourist use has tripled in recent years and is around 3,000 units, estimated the town hall. Although most are licensed, behaviors of certain groups with their noise disturbance at an inconvenient life difficult and rest.

In Ciutat Vella there are 330 cases of illegal apartments expedientados and will also produce about 250 evictions per month. The new measure would help fight bleeding neighbors, reversing the problems generated so far by the tourist flats.

The Town Council has already said it will require trading platforms among which has cited Airbnb and Booking -to provide information on the flats offered in their pages without their owners have made the appropriate administrative record in the Generalitat.

This raises several questions. For example, how far these platforms are required to provide information your customers? Will they act as force public officials and denounce or reject those who are not registered? Will it help this to improve the quality of life for residents? How you will enter the hall from rentals?

And the last and definitive: this measure actually serve to facilitate housing for the underprivileged or remain as an occurrence over the new mayor of Barcelona

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