The Generalitat has determined that there are 118 municipalities that must continue to be included in the stressed residential market area (ZMRT), a classification that establishes, among other things, where rent caps apply. However, according to the Chamber of Urban Property of Barcelona, "only" in 33 of these towns do families have to dedicate more than 30% of their income to paying rent and utilities.

Changes in the system for booking places for Imserso, the social tourism program for pensioners. Until now, interested parties could book a place on one of the subsidized trips from their town hall thanks to the agreement between the public body and the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces (FEMP), signed in 1989. The agreement has fallen and pensioners will have to process their application through one of the travel agencies linked to Imserso, as ARA has learned.

While access to housing is consolidating as the main concern for Catalans, sales continue at all-time highs. Between January and June, 57,349 transactions were formalized: it is the first semester with more activity since 2007, just before the real estate bubble burst.

Technology, new consumption habits and changes in the ways we relate have ushered postal mail into a new era. For the first time, in 2025 in Spain, more packages than letters were sent, according to the National Commission of Markets and Competition (CNMC). Globally, postal sector revenues are rising.

In Santiago de Compostela, rents have risen by 40.26% in five years: they have gone from an average of €444 per month in 2019 to €623 in 2024. Although the prices are far from what Barcelonians pay –an average of €1,137, according to the Generalitat–, Santiago meets the conditions established in the state housing law to be considered a Stressed Residential Market Area (ZMRT), the umbrella term that allows rent caps to be set.

Catalan construction companies have stated that the Generalitat has only put out to tender 3,000 flats from the famous Plan 50,000, thus qualifying what the President of the Government, Salvador Illa, said, who said there were 31,041 "underway" during an intervention in Parliament in October. Furthermore, they have warned that "none are finished". The Catalan executive committed to incorporate 50,000 affordable rental flats into the market, which are to be built by 2030.

The co-founder and executive president of Holaluz, Carlota Pi, receives ARA a few hours after the company has presented the allegations against the file from the Ministry of Ecological Transition that opens the door to the disqualification of the company as a marketer. First thing the next day, at the company's offices, Pi defends that Holaluz's business model is "one hundred percent viable" and that, what it needs, is "scale". She cannot confirm or deny that an alleged non-payment to large electricity companies is the reason for the possible disqualification. She defends, however, that the company's debt "is not excessive, not by a long shot".

Updates to the list of Catalan municipalities that meet the conditions for applying the rent price cap. The Generalitat has reviewed the declaration of municipalities considered a tense residential market area and has incorporated and excluded several towns: after conducting a study on the housing situation, the Government proposes that 302 municipalities have official recognition that their housing market is tense.

While more foreign tourists than ever arrive in Catalonia, domestic tourism is falling. Excursions and trips by Catalans within the territory are down 25.6% compared to before the pandemic, 2019. According to data from the National Statistics Institute (INE) compiled by ARA, trips are down 19.1%, and day trips are down 28.3%.

Héctor and Magnolia work in luxury hotel establishments. He holds a position of responsibility in the kitchen of a well-known hotel in Barcelona, and she cleans rooms in an exclusive tourist establishment near the city's beach. Despite living daily with tourism, Magnolia is part of the 28.8% of Catalans who, according to Idescat, cannot afford to take a week's vacation away from home, and until six or seven years ago, Héctor was also one of them.

In the midst of the housing crisis, the Government has made officially protected housing (HPO) one of its flagship projects. This Friday, the PSC and Comuns have presented a bill to accelerate the creation of officially protected housing that includes five measures, one of which is to give interested owners the option to convert commercial premises, offices, and hotels into protected apartments. According to sources close to the negotiation, "if everything went well and the entire package of measures worked" it could serve to incorporate up to 20,000 apartments. "It was an unavoidable priority to expand the stock of protected housing and ensure that housing fulfills its essential function of being a home," defended the Minister of Territory, Sílvia Paneque, at the joint presentation of this regulation alongside the leader of Comuns, Jéssica Albiach.

The Tax Agency of Catalonia (ATC), linked to the Department of Economy, has recovered 333 million euros that taxpayers had avoided paying to public coffers during 2025, 13% more than the previous year. The study by the Generalitat presented this Thursday only refers to taxes that it has ceded and that, therefore, the Catalan treasury is tasked with collecting.

Renewable energy companies, research centers, and professionals are sounding an alarm: "It has been a very, very, very bad year," assured Víctor Cusí, one of the spokespeople for the Observatory of Renewable Energies of Catalonia (OBERCat), during the presentation of the annual report.

The Catalan energy company Holaluz has gone from being considered a success story to being one step away from losing its operating license. Last week, the Spanish government began the procedures to withdraw its consideration as an electricity marketer and a procedure to transfer their clients to other reference companies. However, what has happened since the applause in entrepreneurship forums and the headlines for Holaluz to have reached this point?

Mortgage signings in Catalonia grew by 9.3% in May compared to the same period last year, according to data from the National Statistics Institute (INE) published this Monday. They gained prominence in a highly strained market and came to represent 84.4% of total operations.

Catalonia once again finds itself among the communities to which the State allocates the fewest resources. According to reports that the Ministry of Finance sent this Friday to political parties and Congress, and to which ARA has had access, the Spanish government spent 8.6% of the total investment it executed in 2025 in autonomous communities in Catalonia. It is the year in which it receives the smallest slice of the pie in the last ten years, a period during which Catalonia has received between 9% and 13% of the investments carried out by the central executive.

Aena has announced that it will renovate terminal 2 of Barcelona-El Prat airport from top to bottom. It plans to invest 153 million euros in a set of actions that will not increase the infrastructure's capacity – therefore, in no case is it an expansion – but which, on the other hand, are "just as important as those carried out in pre-Olympic Barcelona," assured the airport director, Eva Valenzuela, this Friday at a press conference.

New construction is growing in Catalonia, but not to provide housing. In the first six months of the year, the College of Architects of Catalonia (Coac) has issued permits to build or extensively renovate 2.41 million square meters in Catalonia, a 13.46% increase compared to the same period last year. However, although housing is what the ongoing constructions will be predominantly for (almost 1.6 million m², 66% of the total), the increase in actions has been concentrated in other uses – which have grown by 54.24% compared to 2025 – while it has stagnated for housing – an area where it has increased by 0.54%–. In fact, architects have approved 2.59% fewer new construction and renovation homes, down to 7,897: that is, Catalonia is making fewer apartments available than a year ago, but, on the one hand, they are larger, and, on the other hand, renovations are keeping the surface area with ongoing actions for housing stable.

The multinational delivery and transport company Uber has formalized its intention to buy 100% of Delivery Hero, the German group specializing in home food delivery that owns the Catalan Glovo. The American company, which already owns 25% of Delivery Hero, has valued the German group at a total of approximately 13 billion euros.

The Airef, the independent body that monitors public finances, has pointed out the "risk" that Catalonia may not comply with spending rules in 2027, and has opened the door to deviations until 2029. The fiscal authority has opined that, with the economic and financial plan (PEF) presented this year by the Generalitat, "the risk of non-compliance appreciated" for this 2026 is "moderated, compared to other reports", but that it "remains" for next year.