The Housing Crisis in Catalonia | ARTE.tv Documentary

In Barcelona rents are high and there are an estimated 20,000 squats where citizens with few other options have found refuge. Landlords sometimes use the services of private eviction companies that operate on the edge of legality to get rid of squatters. Focus on the housing crisis in Catalonia.

The Housing Crisis in Catalonia | ARTE.tv Documentary
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[markwhitethorn]

The "democratic state" that delegates doing justice to gangs!... I'm Italian and rid of occupiers/squatters can take up to 10 years. The problem is that both land lords and occupiers are right. It has to be the state to guarantee to those people a house. In Denmark if you want to buy a house you have dimostrate you live there! So no room for speculation, AirB&B, etc. Cities must be for citizens primarily then for tourist. Tourists can book an hotel otherwise they can stay at home.

[fabioleonosorio]

We living now in a very cruel world! Humanity is gone from our hearts!

[mansabrice]

As a expat looking to invest in property in Barcelona, I have no qualms with hosting a family or person in a empty home. The problem is, if I buy an apartment and go on vacation to let say see friends in Brussels for 2 weeks and return to find people staying in my home. I now have to fight legally to get them removed. If I had a empty flat I wasn't using I'd gladly let a family use it but that leaves a ton of liability that not even a contract would fix. The Government needs to produce affordable housing or begin a program for it. Like a section 8 voucher program that empty home owners are obligated to accept.

[Retire-pyyk]

there is a need for strong public housing.. i feel for the people who need housing which really is a very fundamental human need but we also have to think about the guy like the shop owner who can't use his for more than a year and he seems to be a normal everyday person ( not Elon rich ) ...

[larsthorwald]

If you can't pay the rent, get out. I don't understand what "rights" the squatters are defending...if everyone has a "right" to a house, why am I paying a mortgage? And when my mortgage is paid off, it will have taken me 15 years of deprivation and hard work to earn what a squatter gets for free? No way. Let the protesters' next squat be a jail cell.

[dianethompson]

It is disgraceful to see those thugs making money by harming poor people. That guy did not have a knife at all. May that bastard who runs that outfit get exactly what he deserves. So great to see such great activists working to protect the less fortunate. Decent housing is a human right.

[cagriaktpe]

I went to Barcelona for an internship, nobody give me a room for 2 months so I have to go the a bad apartment. They were Okupa and I wasn’t know that. For staying nearly 2 months on 15 September polices came to house and kick out us xd. I explained the situation and they said they are sorry for me but they can not do anything for me. In that time I said okay this is really shitty city. It is not safe, there is no rules for protecting people and they don’t like tourists. Maybe Barcelona can be a good city to visit but for living? Hell no.

[johnathandaviddunster]

I would squat a BUILDING belonging to a bank but not a privately owned premises, a good way of finding a bank property is to dress up smart and get viewings through a ESTATE AGENTS specializing in bank repossessions!!!!

[dianestallworthy]

Airbnb has caused all this misery and governments selling off their social housing stock! Originally, Airbnb was meant to be for people with a spare room or cupboard to rent reasonably to fellow travellers. Our greed as humans is astounding! Now we have beautifully restored buildings for temporary occupation, high profits and no community!

[Dejuarez]

It started being a common practice in Barcelona beginning the year 2008 during the economic crisis, unfortunately it’s an expensive market for the money the average person makes a month in a minimum wage or slightly above minimum wage. In the apartment building I used to live the front building was entirely occupied by Ocupas, and they where a nuisance to everyone that lived near them they where NiNI’s (they didn’t work nor study, and the had an illegal pot farm in the building) but if they were nice people like the pensioner couple and the gardener I wouldn’t mind they occupied the building, they need to live somewhere, and the banks kept repossessing the apartments but not putting them back on a market with an affordable rent or price to sell it, they wanted to charge even more than what they truly were valued.

[stephanievillaluz]

Just happy I am paying a small land in my town afraid something like this will happen to me

[mikemike]

They should squat those flats used for Air &BB, and holidays flats especially foreign-owned

[Jumperever]

No mention of price of renting the apartment

[didierduplantier]

During the pandemic, the federal and local governments in the US placed a moratorium on rents. Some people who were fully employed during the crisis decided to take advantage of the situation to screw their landlords. One of my tenants was such a person. These people got a break on paying rents for almost 2 years while the bank and the insurance companies gave the landlords no such break. In a sense they were nothing but squatters

[pragueexpat]

Europe needs to do what the Soviets did decades ago: build huge, not pretty, but still decent apartment blocks to house as many people as possible. Basically applying the principle of economy of scale to construction.

[cne]

I saw a narcopiso people group of like 9 smashing into a building in Exismple the other night, huge fight screaming, .I'm leaving this city. A friends apartment building got taken in Sant Antoni last month...it is s fucking disaster this situation.

[henrietta]

Decent people made homeless via the indifference of society. UK could adopt similar adooting empty buildings.

[lorylovechan]

Bien Trabajo Señor Jorge, Que se vaya los Ocupantes Illegales ...

[markwhitethorn]

Houses are not common goods, they are very limited and having a house is a right recognized by all the European constitutions. Buying more than 1 house should be limited. It should be allowed to buy a house if you dimostrate to live there, that is the main place where you live. Cities must be for citizens first, tourists can go to hotels. Different story for holiday villages, they are created from scratch for touristic purpose.

[steven.wonders]

Part-time gardening wouldn't bring a lot money in any country either, i suppose, and making this whole thing legal is shocking! Study? Go to college? Work full-time? Making an effort? Being financially responsible from early on? Just my two cents!