Sumar calls for rental contracts to be indefinite by default and for a 21% VAT for tourist apartments

He wants to make public aid to the autonomous communities conditional on compliance with the Housing Law and proposes raising the Iprem by 5%

September 16 () –

Sumar wants the open-ended contract to be the default contract for rental housing, as is the case with employment contracts, and for a sanctioning regime to be established in the Housing Law to ensure compliance.

This is what the party has stated in a document that it presented on Monday with its budgetary priorities for 2025 and in which, in terms of housing and in view of the “inaction” of some communities to apply the Housing Law, it proposes to condition the set of public aid for housing destined for the Autonomous Communities to the use of the instruments of this Law to limit rental prices.

“There is a problem which is the centrality, today, of inequality. It is called housing. It is the fundamental right that is not being protected. 50% of people who have a rental contract in our country are at risk of ending up in social exclusion,” denounced the second vice president and promoter of Sumar, Yolanda Díaz.

Sumar also proposes improving the Reference Price Index included in the Housing Law, considering the median price as a reference and including “objectifiable” elements in the housing data to create the index.

It also proposes capping the price of rental housing in stressed areas at 30% of the income of households renting, and temporarily banning the purchase of housing in stressed areas for uses other than regular housing or affordable rent.

“Access to decent and adequate housing is a constitutional right. Therefore, in the current emergency situation in our country, the purchase of housing cannot be for speculative purposes,” stresses Sumar, who specifies that, in the case of autonomous communities with their own civil and regional law, this measure must be taken respecting their powers.

INCREASE TAXES ON TOURIST APARTMENTS

To put an end to illegal tourist rentals and discourage tourist rentals in stressed areas, Sumar proposes to support local councils and autonomous communities with “conditional” resources so that they can enforce regulations regarding tourist apartments and housing in general.

The Commission also calls for raising state taxation on tourist apartments to “drastically” reduce their profitability, making them pay 21% VAT and eliminating the deductibility of financial, amortisation and improvement costs of tourist accommodation in stressed areas in the calculation of their income from personal income tax and corporate tax. Also in stressed areas, it proposes raising the imputation of real estate income to 20% in personal income tax in periods of non-occupation in personal income tax.

The party also advocates revising the taxation of REITs to encourage permanent rentals; forcing tourist rental platforms to provide information to ensure compliance with regulations and regulating seasonal and room-based rentals.

In this regard, it is requested that the Urban Leasing Law extend to seasonal and room-based rental tenants the rights already recognized to long-term tenants; limit deductions in personal income tax on rents from rentals of properties intended for housing to those cases in which these are below the maximum limit established in the state system of reference indexes for the rental price of housing of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Agenda.

The Commission also wants this limitation to be extended to include tax benefits granted to REITs under the special corporate tax regime, and the immediate elimination of Golden Visas.

Sumar is also committed to strengthening the legal defence of tenants “against abuse” by modifying the Civil Procedure Law to include the existence of abusive clauses as grounds for opposition, establishing real portability for mortgages between entities and introducing a regulated fixed-rate mortgage.

He also advocates the implementation of a programme to eradicate evictions for mortgages on first homes, whereby the State would take charge of the home and the mortgage, incorporating the home into the public housing stock, and the family would continue to live there with a social rent related to their income.

EXPANDING THE SUPPLY OF AFFORDABLE RENTAL HOUSING

To solve the housing problem in a structural way, Sumar proposes allocating 1% of the annual GDP to investment in affordable and non-disqualifiable public rental housing. Its financing during the first years would be provided by a state fund endowed with 40 billion euros from soft loans from European funds.

This fund would aim to condition municipalities and autonomous communities to effectively expand the affordable rental housing stock and would be distributed based on the level of pressure in access to housing. It would be redistributed if it is not used and would be conditional on the development of various actions.

Sumar also wants 500,000 social rental homes to be built during this legislative period, costing between 400 and 600 euros, in stressed areas where the mobilisation of vacant housing is insufficient; and to change the corporate purpose of Sareb in order to preferentially use its assets to create a public housing stock for affordable rentals.

INCREASE IN SMI AND IPREM

In terms of employment, Sumar stresses that the Ministry of Labour will continue to promote measures to increase real wages and improve the distribution of productivity, such as reducing working hours, increasing the minimum interprofessional wage (SMI) or strengthening collective bargaining. For the Iprem, it proposes a 5% increase.

The organisation also aims to strengthen the individual and collective bargaining power of workers by bringing the economic information from the Business Margins Observatory to the negotiating tables of sectoral collective agreements.

In order to control food prices, the Commission advocates introducing a levy to reduce the excessive margins of large companies in the production and distribution chain, which would penalise and correct “abusive and anti-competitive” behaviour, and the creation of a Basic Food Stabilisation Fund to reduce price fluctuations in response to crop volatility. It also calls for greater monitoring and regulation of company margins.

In pensions, he calls for progress in improving minimum and non-contributory pensions, with increases above inflation and, in the Civil Service, salary increases agreed with unions that guarantee their purchasing power, including a salary guarantee clause.

Sumar also calls for the extension of public transport subsidies in force in 2024 to 2025 under the same terms, which implies, among other measures, free travel on commuter and medium-distance trains and a 50% reduction in urban transport passes.

It also proposes developing a public social leasing programme for electric vehicles similar to the one implemented in France, consisting of a rental with the right to buy of 100 euros per month for urban vehicles and 150 euros for family vehicles for people with low and middle incomes.