The housing emergency calls for a transversal pact

We are living through a housing emergency. Construction costs have skyrocketed, while the economic capacity of many families has not grown at the same pace. Today, having a job no longer guarantees access to decent housing. This situation goes far beyond the real estate market: it is a social crisis that limits people's opportunities, weakens the cohesion of neighborhoods, and compromises the future of the country.

At the same time, this emergency forces us to face two inseparable challenges: guaranteeing access to housing and building healthy, affordable homes capable of protecting us against an increasingly extreme climate. A challenge that is especially urgent in the Mediterranean, where the effects of climate change are intensifying more rapidly.

The urgency has also reached Europe: the European Commission has presented the first European Affordable Housing Plan, after only seven months of consultations. The reason is that responding to this challenge requires bold policies and commitment beyond electoral cycles. We need a cross-cutting pact for housing that guarantees legal stability, mobilizes public and private investment, and strengthens the capacity of administrations.

A pact that allows for the activation of new plans and the exploration of multiple residential initiatives through an exceptional legal framework that makes procedures more flexible and allows us to act with the speed that this crisis demands, without ever lowering the requirements for quality, habitability, and energy efficiency.

We must face the real conditions under which we build today. Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, construction costs have increased by up to 40%, according to sector data.

Industrialization offers opportunities to innovate and optimize processes, but it requires stable demand and investment. And, in the meantime, we continue to need professionals in the construction trades. Giving prestige to these professions, promoting training, and attracting new generations is just as important as incorporating technology. Without the people who must build and rehabilitate homes, no quantitative goal will be possible.

There are, moreover, two factors that are often left out of public debate and that make housing more expensive: time and risk. Building on ready-to-build land requires between 4 and 5 years; on developable land, between 8 and 12. But risk is even more decisive: constant legislative changes make it difficult to plan long-term investments. This uncertainty slows down investment or forces the provision of a safety coefficient that implies a greater economic margin to cover risks. In both cases, the result is the same: fewer homes and higher prices.

Therefore, streamlining procedures is essential. We need strong administrations, with sufficient technical teams, and closer collaboration with professional associations, which, as public law corporations, are at the service of the administrations and can contribute to reinforcing their technical capacity.

Recovering technical project review in initial phases, strengthening trust in architects, and facilitating the work of administration professionals are concrete ways to reduce timelines.

And we have experiences that demonstrate the value of this commitment. This year the Architects' Association of Catalonia has recognized the Barcelona Metropolitan Area with the COAC Medal for its contribution to a more cohesive, sustainable, and habitable metropolis.

The work of the AMB architects and the public housing projects promoted by Impsol demonstrate how trust in professional talent and quality competitions can drive innovation: homes that make better use of square meters by reducing corridors and entrance halls, shared spaces that favor neighborhood relations, and architectural solutions that maintain a comfortable temperature with less need for air conditioning or heating and reduce the energy expenditure of families.

A sign of the interest that this way of understanding housing awakens is that the Impsol book was the best-selling one during the International Congress of Architects, which brought together more than 10,000 professionals from around the world.

The urgency of housing must give us the courage to change what today prevents progress, without renouncing what protects us. We need, together, to act better, with more cooperation, trust, and shared responsibility, and to create the conditions so that decisions are transformed into what we really need: decent, affordable homes prepared for the future.