Home sales soared 52.3% in March compared to the same month last year, reaching 10,345 transactions in Catalonia, according to provisional data from the National Statistics Institute (INE) published this Friday. This is the best figure for the third month of the year since 2007, the same year the historical series began and just before the real estate bubble burst. Across the country, home sales increased, although less so in Catalonia, by 40.6%, with 62,808 transactions, also the highest volume for a month of March since 2007. In the first quarter as a whole, Catalonia saw 29,782 transactions, 23% more than in the same quarter, and 183,140 homes, a 20.7% increase.

Housing is an issue that has gained prominence among citizens' concerns in recent years. Increasingly high prices due to a supply that doesn't keep up with demand and a shrinking and extremely expensive rental market shape the current landscape. And it has fueled discontent among an increasing number of citizens, especially younger ones. Governments, which for many years have left the functioning of the housing market in the hands of the free market, are now rushing to solve a problem that takes time: a housing stock isn't built overnight. The trend so far has led us to levels of public and/or subsidized housing that place us at the bottom of the European list.