Territorial policy Depopulate the south of La Palma?
“It is not true that the real estate market on La Palma has fallen into chaos because of the eruption, as has been said. The chaos and the lack of supply already existed for years, especially in the rent.
There is a lot of tourist rent, there is a lot of civil servant that arrives destined to the island and there are very few houses
. La Palma has never had enough supply and now we are going to find a very big problem. But it will not be because people are opportunistic and take advantage of the tragedy to raise prices. Whoever has a room has opened it to those who have lost their home. Whoever has a place for livestock has taken in the livestock of the displaced. '
Anjara Rodríguez works from the Inmocasa real estate agency, in the Breña Alta area, on the eastern side of La Palma, the furthest from the Cumbre Vieja eruption. His story explains the housing crisis that has broken out on his island: 6,500 displaced people, between 300 and 1,000 homes that will be destroyed, large areas that will be disabled by lava or by new prevention plans for human habitat ... It will not be easy to absorb this disaster on an island that has remained stable at 80,000 inhabitants for years, among other things,
due to its housing deficit
.
«The landscape of this island is very protected. La Palma is a World Biosphere Reserve and
there is little land to develop
. In the west, which is the most affected by the volcano, there has been a lot of pressure from foreign buyers because in the west the climate is better than in the east. A study even came out that said that Tazacorte is the place in Europe with the most hours of sunshine a year, ”explains Rodríguez.
That is why, for years, municipalities such as Los Llanos de Aridane mutated to a market model that could be compared to that of Menorca: Swiss, British and, above all, Germans began to buy houses in the region, often scattered and very large. , to turn them into your retirement homes.
Hotel tourism is not significant on La Palma
; however, second homes grew to saturate the residential market.
"Many foreigners can pay more and make the market more expensive, but that is not different from what happens in all of Spain," explain Otniel Marrero and Jerry Wellmann, real estate agents in Tazacorte, in the area most affected by the volcano. "
A one-bedroom apartment could be rented for 400 or 500 euros a month
and sold for 100,000 euros, maybe more depending on the area." It is not much for a Munich professional but it is for a young La Palma player.
Or for someone evicted by the volcano: «The problem is that, since the crisis,
no new housing has been built on La Palma
. There are no houses to rent, no matter how hard we look for them. Yesterday I got a rent for a family that was one of the first to be evicted. I saw them arrive with two cars and four little things that they took out, because they were among the first to leave and they didn't have time for anything.
The landlord lowered the price and gave them the keys before there is a contract, you can not blame him for anything
. But it is a house that we have found among a thousand that we would need ”, explains Rodríguez. "People call to ask, they get emotional, they cry, I cry with them ... but if there are no houses we can't do anything."
«In Tazacorte there is a building that is almost empty that could be rescued.
But
what is there?
15 or 20 homes?
»Otniel Marrero wonders.
He himself has lost his home.
He spent one night in his car, another night in the camp set up by the Army and, for the moment, he takes refuge in the home of a client who was not occupying it.
Ramón Hernández is his colleague at the Dara Inmobiliaria agency, in Santa Cruz de La Palma.
His vision is very similar.
“It is not that the apartments for rent have risen these days.
It is that they do not exist.
My job has become very difficult for two or three years because it is almost impossible to find a flat for clients.
Why are there no new homes on the island? «Because it is an investment that has a lot of risk.
Valuations in appraisal have dropped, construction costs have risen, the profit margin is very tight and nobody dares
. The promotions that were left empty in the crisis were all sold. There were only two left in Tazacorte and Los Llanos and the Government of the Canary Islands has announced that it is going to buy them for relocation. There are 70 homes that will do something but will not solve the problem.
Yesterday morning, the Government of the islands announced that it will expand its offer and that it will buy 280 homes throughout the island and that it will use them to relocate the victims of the Cumbre Vieja. The Canarian Housing Institute has close to three million euros of its own funds, to which must be added the aid that comes from the EU and the Government of Spain, which has already announced the approval of a Royal Decree to help The Palm.
It is not yet clear whether the relocated will access those homes as tenants
. «It is still too early to give an answer; We are solving the emergency and, for now, the priority is to provide a housing response to families. When the emergency passes, the cases will be studied in a particular way ", explain sources from the Canarian Government.
"It will be necessary to rethink many things: it will be necessary to requalify land in other areas of the island and it will be necessary to put
bureaucratic facilities
", Anjara Rodríguez concludes.
But the lava will make your island more impractical.
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