The single window is narrow, barely three hands wide, and the light filters through bars on the ground floor to illuminate a small room. The bathroom is small, with a nested bath of less than a meter and hardly any room for the toilet. This ground floor, in an area of old apartments and converted business premises in the San Blas-Canillejas district, is turned upside down. although does not have a resident certificate, the owner is renovating it to rent it out again, for 550 euros per month. Ten years ago, when the real estate crisis caused prices to collapse, the same amount could pay for a small apartment, a house in good condition in the capital Madrid.
Two employees work on the site of San Blas-Canillejas, a rapid renovation in which the owner has invested 12,000 euros. “In black, of course, because that 21% VAT is a lot,” acknowledges the contractor, who shows the “good” tiles with which you can cover the bare walls of the bathroom. “There will be a complete kitchen, all ready,” he gestures in the short, narrow hallway, where the refrigerator, washing machine and microwave will be stacked. In the living room, which is covered by two and a half steps, “there is moisture” which will be covered with a specific plasterboard, and the elongated window will be expanded to “1.40 by 1.50” meters.
«The previous owner reduced the size of the window, he had rented it but it was destroyed and I was not going to rent something that is in bad condition. “The water came out of the tap… how am I going to rent something like that?”, says the landlord, Cándido (not his real name) on the phone. He plans to charge some 600 euros per month for those 32 square meters renovated, but the problem lies in the market, that there are slums for 700 euros per month, that there are tenants who pay for them because there are no more options, that commercial properties become questionable homes because the real estate supply in the city is limited.
—I don't rent to Latin Americans.
-Because?
—Because two have already contacted me to come with their whole family, with their wife and their son, and I told them that they cannot live there, that it is for only one person.
The only downside, Cándido continues, is that this 30 square meter studio is registered as store. “I don't know why… The fact that it's registered as a property means you can't be registered there,” he explains. That's why they look for students who don't care about that detail and who prefer to stay for at least a year, such as 'an interested Frenchman who wants it for nine months'. Initially he asked for 550 euros per month, but within a few days he increased that to 650 euros. “Many people write to me,” he emphasizes, “there are no studies for those prices, if you look closely there are none.”
A studio for rent of no more than 30 square meters, in San Diego, one of the most vulnerable neighborhoods of Madrid
It's true. On the same day of the conversation with Cándido, in mid-April, a search on Idealista returned only four studios in the capital for 600 euros per month or less. This Monday, April 6, the real estate portal collected 8,188 rental properties in the city alone nine studios and two apartments in San Diego, one of the most vulnerable areas of Madrid, which will cost no more than 600 euros per month, with an average price of 21.60 euros per square meter. Almost double what it was ten years ago. Two weeks after the call, Carlos withdrew the advertisement: he managed to rent out his renovated property.
From minimum to maximum
In December 2013, rents in Madrid reached their lowest point; Excessive supply, low demand and credit problems strangled the real estate market. Today the tables are turned, the imbalance between supply and demand has been reversed. “It is complex to compare the real estate markets of ten years ago and today, but they are directly linked,” said Idealista spokesperson Francisco Iñareta. The year 2013 was the worst of the crisis that started in 2007 and a turning point in the recovery. “At that time, rent was not on the agenda, but the debate revolved around the problems of many families who were unable to meet their mortgage obligations and where the price of the property did not cover the amount still owed to the bank,” Iñareta specifies.
Price evolution
of rent in Madrid
In euros/square meter.
Data as of December each year
Fact
of April
Source: Idealista/ABC
Evolution of rental prices in Madrid
In euros/square meters. Data as of December each year
Fact
of April
Source: Idealista/ABC
Unpaid mortgages piled up, tens of thousands of houses sank savings banks and Sareb (Association for the Management of Assets from Bank Restructuring) was born to sell all those problematic assets. “It is also at this moment that the government of Mariano Rajoy is giving a boost to SOCIMIs, to professionalize the rental market and ensure that a large part of these properties reach the rental market,” explains the spokesperson of the real estate portal . Over the past decade, demand for rental properties has grown and prices have skyrocketed, except during the pandemic.
Price per square meter
According to data from Idealista, today one can afford a 'house' of 30 square meters with 600 euros; With the same amount you could rent an apartment of 53 square meters in 2013
Despite being two different contexts, the main people affected in 2013 and 2024 are the same. Young people with a salary that will not allow them to emancipate themselves unless they accept small studies in exchange for the majority of their salary, and vulnerable families chasing affordable rent and crammed into 40 square meters. According to the figures that Idealista manages about price developments in the city, 600 euros per month can amount to a lot today House of 31.25 square meters. With the same money you could rent an apartment of 53.57 square meters in 2013; a small house, with a bedroom, living room, kitchen and bathroom, all different rooms.
The rental market in Madrid has risen from the historic minimum of 11.1 euros per square meter in December 2013 to maximum peak, 19.2 euros per square meter last April. Therefore, poorly lit spaces are offered, many of which are not even intended for residential use. Or broken houses, divided into a barely habitable part, with a bathroom and a bed for students built in. Or underground storage spaces, with a narrow window at the top, exactly at ground level. It is a market “where available housing supply is declining by double digits year after year, prices are rising sharply and there is enormous anxiety among families in need of a home, who are finding themselves competing with dozens of other families for the same home.” ' is an example of Iñareta, emphasizing that 'a change in direction is needed that increases supply and starts to relax prices'.
A mattress fitted into an attic studio in Lavapiés that is rented for 600 euros per month
Until that change of course takes place, tenants are sometimes confronted with unlikely cases. The owner of a cramped studio in the Ventas district asks for 650 euros per month and an overwhelming list of financial requirements: employment contract for an indefinite period, the last three wage payments, two months' deposit, the current month. And another one:
—Do you have demonstrable savings greater than 3,000 euros?
—Is all that necessary for a rent of 650 euros?
—These are requirements of the insurer and the owner.
A studio of 25 square meters that Uniplaces rents for 600 euros per month and which cannot be viewed
Other studios, 25 square meters for 600 euros per month (where the mattress is barely a few meters away from the kitchen, where the bathroom is so narrow that it seems difficult to sit on the toilet without bumping into the wall), are that's not even available. They can visit, such as those managed by Uniplaces: “We verify the house and take photos to verify its authenticity.” You take it, for 600 euros, or leave it.