Evicted the 87-year-old neighbor from Madrid who was being demanded a rent of 1,650 euros

MadridThe eviction of Maricarmen, an 87-year-old resident of Madrid who uses a wheelchair, was carried out this Wednesday in the fourth attempt to remove her from her home. Although since Tuesday afternoon hundreds of neighbors and members of the Tenants' Union of the Spanish capital had gathered and installed themselves outside the building, the National Police riot squad executed the eviction order, which led to moments of great tension: the Union has denounced the use of "violence" by the police, with blows to the heads of protesters, as well as the use of pepper spray. The property owner, the investment fund Urbagestión Desarrollo e Inversión S.L., proposed a rent increase to 1,650 euros, which Maricarmen could not afford: she has a pension of 1,350 euros and until now was paying 500 euros in rent, because she had an old rent contract. Despite attempts at negotiation, the fund has remained firm. Now the neighbor does not know where she will go and, for the moment, the Madrid City Council has assured that she has an "emergency spot" in a nursing home.

It is the harshest face of an emergency that has been hitting the State for some time and which has triggered an exchange of political recriminations. The Spanish government is pressuring the Community of Madrid and the City Council for their inaction, and its left-wing partners are demanding the immediate recovery of the Spanish executive's housing decree that incorporates an anti-eviction measure, which the PP, Vox, and Junts struck down at the time. In fact, Maricarmen's eviction coincides with the report by the Barcelona Tenants' Union regarding the suicide of Olga, a woman from L'Hospitalet, a few months after being evicted. At the same time, this Monday saw the eviction of Sílvia Sanz from her apartment in the Gràcia neighborhood (Barcelona), where she had lived for 13 years. Social organizations have been demanding for months the recovery of the anti-eviction moratorium for vulnerable tenants to avoid situations like these.

A blocked decree

The anti-eviction moratorium was in effect until December 31, 2025, and the Spanish government proposed extending it in an omnibus decree (which incorporated fiscal and energy measures due to the war in Ukraine and later in the Middle East). The right-wing in Congress (PP, Vox, and Junts), however, struck it down. Later, the Spanish government tried again by splitting the text (separating the measures strictly linked to housing), but that did not prosper either. Everyone expected that in the last council of ministers before the summer holidays the Spanish government would approve it again, but the Moncloa decided to leave it for September. The argument from the right is that private landlords should not have to assume the housing emergency of those who cannot afford rent increases—in Maricarmen's case, it exceeded her pension—and that it should be the State that provides the alternative, even when one has lived in the same property their whole life. However, waiting lists at the administration are saturated.

"I don't know what Pedro Sánchez's government is doing, but it is exactly the opposite of what was expected when people voted for them on July 23, 2023. I don't understand this police deployment; it has been brutal violence against the activists, against Maricarmen herself," declared the leader of Podemos, Ione Belarra, in the corridors of Congress.

"Today is a turning point," affirmed the spokesperson for Sumar in Congress, Ernest Urtasun, who demanded that "all political forces" support a decree that, in his view, should be approved as early as next week in the council of ministers. In fact, Urtasun said that it is being "negotiated" with all forces. "We don't have time," he insisted. Minister Pablo Bustinduy (Sumar) reprimanded the PSOE for not having done it sooner: "It is an agreement announced at the Moncloa [in July] and it has not been fulfilled, and these are the results. It cannot wait any longer".

The Minister of Housing, Isabel Rodríguez, has also appealed to the partners of the investiture bloc, for whom the Maricarmen case opens a new front. Rodríguez has criticized the Madrid government of Isabel Díaz Ayuso (PP), as well as the City Council, for having laid out a "red carpet" for investment funds like those that have acquired the Madrid resident's home. This Tuesday, in fact, the Community inaugurated The District fair, the international real estate investment meeting that left Barcelona last year due to social pressure. Meanwhile, PP leaders in Congress are downplaying the housing drama. They speak of an isolated case and call for the construction of housing

A case that began eight years ago

In 2018, the family that owned the building sold the entire property to Renta Corporación, one of the major real estate groups in the State. At that time, they proposed to Maricarmen that she could buy the apartment, but she could not afford the price they were asking. It is at this moment that the investment fund and the problems appear. Urbagestión Desarrollo e Inversión S.L. first proposed an increase in the rent to 2,650 euros. "I refuse to leave. I will fight," the neighbor claimed some time ago.