Anthony Piovesan
Benalmadena council has launched a financial aid package to help promote long-term residential rentals, instead of short term options for tourists.
It comes amid a chronic shortage of long-term rentals in the Costa del Sol resort town.
These are subsidies to encourage long-term residential rentals as opposed to purely tourist rentals, under the package.
After a huge demand from applicants, the budget was increased to 700,000 euros.
Among the requirements for landlords to qualify for compensation is that the aid be earmarked for residential rental for a period of between one and five years.
Also the monthly rent may not exceed 700 euros for one-bedroom homes, 800 euros for two-bedroom homes and 900 euros for homes with three or more bedrooms.
The subsidies will be distributed in amounts ranging from 4,000 to 6,000 euros.
“As is the case in most tourist towns, Benalmádena has a problem of access to housing: the tourist pressure means that there are fewer and fewer homes for long-term residential rental,” said the Mayor of Benalmádena, Víctor Navas.
And Navas added a worrying fact about the exploitation of housing for tourists: “If in 2016 there were 2,000 bed units in housing for tourist purposes, that figure has shot up in 2023 to almost 27,000 units, an increase that has come from housing that was previously dedicated to residential rental”.
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