As protests continue to ripple across European cities, the Italian Green MEP Benedetta Scuderi reflects on her own experiences of police repression, from holding a peace flag near a Brussels protest to facing the fury that followed the flotilla to Gaza. She spoke to EUobserver about the EU’s housing priorities, Italy’s elections, and how the far-right has captured freedom of expression for its own use.
You were detained by police in July, a few hundred meters from a far-right protest calling for “re-migration”. How has the rise of the far-right stalled some key areas, like freedom of speech?
The rise of the far-right is really threatening European democracy as we know it. It has never been perfect, but it allowed people to protest. Now, we only let certain people express their dissent.
In the European Parliament, people can discriminate and use hate speech because of their freedom of expression, but as you go out of parliament with a Palestinian flag, then you’re a terrorist. So, how is it possible that last Strasbourg plenary, I could hear my colleagues saying that Muslims are a threat, and there are no consequences? And then I go out and I say, “Free Palestine,” and I’ll be arrested.
This double standard is extremely problematic. The fact that not allowing fascist symbols within the parliament also meaning that no other symbol can be shown, is not okay. Because we need to be fine to say that certain things are discriminatory and against European values, without having to say that everything else is not allowed.
We also need to be able to accept dissent. What is happening all over Europe, with violence increasing towards activists, we’re seeing it target only a certain kind of activists. In Italy, fascist protests are ignored by police. Farmers can come to the parliament with tractors, and that’s completely fine. And then we have 20 people doing a sit-in for Palestine in front of the parliament, and getting their heads smashed.
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The lack of teachers (particularly in areas where rents are at their highest: viz. Lisbon/ Algarve) has led municipalities to start thinking outside the box. Two town halls (Grândola and
The implicit interest rate on mortgage loans rose again in September, extending the upward trend to 3.194%, reaching its highest level since September 2025, according to data released by INE
The European Parliament has called for more spending to build affordable houses — using funds for regional development that currently make up a third of the EU budget.
Cohesion funds should be used to protect the ‘right to stay’ in rural areas or in small cities, a principle that the parliament wants to write into the new budget legislation.
Peripheral regions often face depopulation due to few job opportunities, according to a parliamentary non-binding report passed with 601 votes in favour, 20 against, and 36 abstentions on Tuesday (20 October).
MEPs are also calling for strong cohesion funds that would allow cities to better prepare for climate emergencies and provide a budget for additional investments in housing.
Cohesion funds, which account for a total of €48.03bn in the existing 2021-2027 EU budget, usually finance infrastructure projects, like bridges, roads, or railways in countries with a lower-than-average per capita gross national income.
The commission proposed significant cuts to reduce regional funds in the next multi-annual budget, set to cover 2028-34, but a group of 16 member states, often benefitting from the funding, opposed the reduction.
Regional development plays a key role in European integration since it is the “only instrument which can unite all of us,” and should not be reduced in the next EU budget, said Left Lithuanian MEP Vytenis Povilas Andriukaitis during a plenary debate on Monday (19 October).
Cohesion funds “could be the response to the radicalisation of Europe,” Fredis Beleris, a German centre-right MEP said.
For that to happen, cohesion funds must be accessible for small and medium-sized cities, who often struggle with formalities linked to EU funds, said Denis Nesci, Italian conservative MEP spearheading the file.
Small municipalities should be able to access cohesion funds “on an equal footing as bigger cities,” he said, echoing the dominant centre-right commission’s position and its aim to simplify regulations.
European Union ministers have adopted a new recommendation calling for stronger measures to prevent homelessness and housing exclusion, as governments face increasing pressure over housing shortages and the cost of accommodation.
The recommendation was approved at a meeting of employment and social affairs ministers in Luxembourg on Monday, 19 October, and forms part of the European Commission’s wider efforts to address Europe’s housing crisis.
It proposes measures ranging from early intervention for households facing eviction to increased investment in affordable housing, improved access to social services and more coordinated support for people without permanent accommodation.
However, the recommendation is not legally binding. Member States will retain responsibility for deciding which measures to introduce, how they should be financed and the extent to which existing national housing policies should be changed.
More than one million people affected
According to the Council’s announcement, more than one million people are estimated to experience homelessness across the European Union.
The problem extends beyond people sleeping on streets or using emergency shelters.
The term housing exclusion also encompasses households living in inadequate accommodation, people facing imminent eviction and those unable to secure stable housing because of financial or personal circumstances.
The Council identifies poverty, unemployment, domestic violence, disability, poor health and insufficient affordable housing among the factors contributing to the problem.
Housing costs have also risen considerably faster than incomes in several European countries.
Between 2013 and 2024, nominal house prices increased by more than 60 per cent across the EU. In some Member States, average increases exceeded 220 per cent during the same period.
These developments have placed additional pressure on households with lower incomes, particularly in cities where rental accommodation is increasingly expensive and social housing is limited.
The shortage affects not only unemployed people but also individuals in paid employment whose earnings are insufficient to cover market rents.
Prevention before eviction
A central element of the new recommendation is the introduction or strengthening of national strategies intended to prevent homelessness before people lose their accommodation.
The Council encourages Member States to establish early-warning mechanisms capable of identifying households experiencing serious financial or housing difficulties.
Proposed interventions include debt counselling, emergency rental assistance, mediation between landlords and tenants, and appropriate safeguards against forced eviction.
The emphasis on prevention reflects the potentially substantial social and financial consequences of losing stable accommodation.
Once a person becomes homeless, obtaining employment, maintaining healthcare arrangements and securing permanent accommodation can become considerably more difficult.
The Council also calls for particular attention to children, young people leaving care and people facing domestic abuse.
Member States are encouraged to ensure that children have access to adequate housing and that young people leaving institutional or foster care are not placed at risk of homelessness because appropriate support arrangements are unavailable.
Greater emphasis on permanent housing
The recommendation promotes a housing-led approach, under which securing suitable and stable accommodation becomes a central element of the response to homelessness.
This differs from policies relying primarily on emergency shelters or temporary accommodation, although such facilities remain necessary for people facing immediate housing difficulties.
Housing-led programmes can include permanent accommodation accompanied by individual support services, depending on the person’s circumstances.
The Council also proposes simplifying access to social and healthcare services through integrated arrangements that allow people to obtain assistance without repeatedly approaching different public authorities.
One suggested model involves providing access to relevant services through a single contact point, with support from social workers, healthcare professionals and other organisations.
However, access to permanent housing ultimately depends on the availability of suitable properties.
The recommendation therefore calls for increased public and private investment in affordable and social housing, renovation of existing accommodation and support for non-profit housing models.
Questions over implementation and funding
The non-binding character of the recommendation remains one of its principal limitations.
European institutions can coordinate policies, provide guidance and support investment, but national governments and local authorities retain substantial responsibility for housing provision and social welfare arrangements.
The recommendation does not automatically establish a new EU housing entitlement or provide dedicated funding to every Member State.
Its effectiveness will depend on whether governments introduce measures capable of increasing housing supply and reducing the number of people entering homelessness.
The European Federation of National Organisations Working with the Homeless, known as FEANTSA, previously welcomed the Commission’s proposal while identifying shortcomings.
In its assessment of the original proposal, the organisation argued that EU policy should place greater emphasis on permanently ending homelessness rather than primarily managing housing exclusion.
It also questioned the adequacy of funding arrangements and the proposed five-year interval for national progress reporting.
Five-year assessment planned
Under the adopted recommendation, Member States are encouraged to provide the European Commission with information on the effectiveness of their national strategies every five years.
The Commission is expected to evaluate national progress and report to the Council five years after the recommendation’s adoption.
The policy follows the European Affordable Housing Plan, presented in December 2025, and the EU’s Anti-Poverty Strategy, introduced in May 2026.
Together, these initiatives seek to expand the Union’s role in coordinating housing policy without transferring national housing responsibilities to Brussels.
The first indication of whether the recommendation will produce measurable results will come from national decisions on social housing investment, eviction prevention and access to permanent accommodation. Without changes to those practical arrangements, the Council’s commitments will remain principally a framework for voluntary cooperation.
When we can’t even afford to rent or buy somewhere to live, we have to ask: did we give the financial sector too much power?
Leilani Farha is the former UN special rapporteur on adequate housing
In the summer of 2021, I visited a homeless community in a park in Toronto, Canada, and spoke to one of the residents. He was living in a tent in the shadow of brand new skyscrapers, and had been homeless for about five years. At one point he swivelled around, pointed up at a crane on the skyline, and said: “Who are they building those for? Definitely not for me.”
He was right. And he captured something experienced by ordinary people around the world: the growing conviction that the housing system is no longer tethered to their needs. What he was pointing at is not just a housing crisis. It is a crisis of democracy.
Leilani Farha is the 2026 CBC Massey lecturer. This piece is based on her new book: Housing Inc.: A Global Takeover and Our Fight for Home. She is the former UN special rapporteur on adequate housing and the global director of the international human rights organisation, The Shift
EUobserver is proud to have an editorial partnership with Europod to co-publish the podcast series “Briefed” hosted by Léa Marchal. The podcast is available on all major platforms.
Find the full transcript below:
Do you remember the Yellow Vests movement that shook France 2018? On TikTok, a young user has called for a national mobilisation on the seventeenth of October against the cost of living, and the video quickly went viral. So could the Yellow Vests make their big return?
“Please, give us a date, we’re ready to protest! We young people are struggling. We just can’t make a living anymore,” that’s what Justine, a TikToker from Normandy in France has posted a few weeks ago, while wearing a fluorescent yellow vest.
The reference to the 2018 Yellow Vests is unmistakable. The French movement, which began in protest at rising fuel prices, has been widely revived on social media in recent weeks, especially by younger users.
Our colleague Romane Lizée from StreetPress, a fellow member of the Sphera Network alongside Europod, spoke to some of them: young people reviving a protest movement they only knew from a distance.
Yves, a 24-year-old TikToker with over 80,000 followers, made a video called “Survival Guide for the Yellow Vests 2026”. He gives would-be protesters practical advice, such as bringing thick ski goggles or writing a lawyer’s phone number on a piece of paper.
So why is the movement resurfacing now? For many, the movement has come to stand for a general sense of being fed up, something they still feel today.
“Eight years ago, France put on the yellow vest because petrol hit 1.50 euros a litre, and now we’re almost at three euros and nothing is happening!” That’s how Saïd, a 23-year-old delivery driver, sees it.
The economic context is indeed worse than it was eight years ago. The price of fuel is now almost 2.40 euros a litre.
Throughout September, a series of protests followed one another, called by different professions and for different reasons: climate action, firefighters, a public-sector strike, the law on sexual violence, and finally the student blockades.
High school students have been protesting for a few weeks now, blockading their schools to demand better conditions. We talked about this in a previous Briefed episode. You can find the link in the description.
Now, will the protest be as big and long-lasting as the one in 2018?
Online, a petition launched by the website 17octobregiletjaune, which calls for the protest, has gathered more than 21,000 signatures. Over a thousand actions across the country have been identified on a map by the same website: mostly protests in several cities, but also actions on roundabouts and at petrol stations.
Youth organisations, students’ unions and education staff have already answered the call. More importantly, the CGT, one of France’s main labour unions, has backed it, as have some political figures, like Marine Tondelier, the Green candidate for the presidential election. Still, the true extent of the movement is difficult to predict.
In other European countries, protests are also multiplying, especially among young people. In Spain, huge demonstrations for the right to housing have been taking place in several cities since mid-September. They went quite far: they pushed Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez to call snap elections.
In Brussels, on October 9th, thousands of protesters, including rail workers, teachers, and university and secondary school students, marched against the federal government’s policies, in particular its socio-economic measures. Here again, precarity is a central grievance.
In Italy, on October 8th, students called for mobilisation, notably by camping in front of universities across the country to protest against the sharp rise in tuition fees and student rents.
The triggers behind these protests are not all the same, and the mobilisations take different forms from country to country. But the goal is broadly the same: to call for better living conditions and to defend basic social rights. And young people are particularly mobilised.
Dutch Housing Minister Elanor Boekholt-O’Sullivan drew sharp criticism this week after defending priority access to scarce social housing for recognized refugees, arguing that many young Dutch first-time home seekers “can still live with their parents.”
In an interview with De Telegraaf, the D66 minister was asked why status holders — asylum seekers granted residence permits — should receive preference for social rental homes while Dutch “starters” face long waiting lists and delayed independence. She responded that “we see that a lot of starters can still, or are allowed to, live with their parents.”
Migrants get affordable housing before Dutch natives.
When asked why migrants receive access to affordable housing before young Dutch people looking for a "starter" home, the Dutch housing minister said that many Dutch first-time home seekers "can still live with their parents."
Mass migration contributed to 60% of the increase in housing demand in the Netherlands since 2015, yet Minister Elanor Boekholt-O’Sullivan still believes in putting migrants first.
"For me, the fundamental principle is that anyone who is allowed to and wants to live in the Netherlands gets a roof over their head," she said.
In the Netherlands, Dutch natives are increasingly relegated to living with their parents while migrants get to skip massive waiting lists and gain "emergency" access to cheap social housing.
Follow: @RMXnews
Dutch commentator and activist Eva Vlaardingerbroek wrote on X that the policy amounted to “systemic racism.”
“And not just the ‘new’ newcomers. A 25-year-old Syrian who came here with his parents years ago jumps the queue for a home when he decides he wants to live on his own. Meaning a 25-year-old white Dutch guy can forget about getting his own place and ends up on waiting lists for 10+ years,” she wrote, adding: “Putting the interests of foreigners above the interests of the native population needs to end.”
Talking about systemic racism: Young Dutch people can barely find a place to live, because migration drove 60% of the housing demand since 2015, regular prices are insane, and migrants get PRIORITY for the affordable social housing.
And not just the “new” newcomers. A 25-year-old Syrian who came here with his parents years ago jumps the queue for a home when he decides he wants to live on his own. Meaning a 25 year-old white Dutch guy can forget about getting his own place and ends up on waiting lists for 10+ years.
But according to our minister of housing that’s fine because they can just continue to “live with their parents.”
Putting the interests of foreigners above the interests of the native population, needs to end.
That’s why with the @SaveEuropeAct, apart from demanding closed borders and Remigration, we also demand Removing social welfare incentives and benefits that function as pull factors for migration.
Boekholt-O’Sullivan, an Irish-born former lieutenant general in the Dutch Air Force who took office earlier this year, claims that anyone who wants to live in the Netherlands should get a roof but does not address the major housing crisis brought on by mass immigration.
“For me, the fundamental principle is that anyone who is allowed to and wants to live in the Netherlands gets a roof over their head,” she said. She noted that status holders typically leave asylum reception centers and argued that alternatives such as remaining in centers, homelessness, hotels or cruise ships were unacceptable, so priority allocation should continue until other solutions exist.
The remarks landed amid fresh data underscoring migration’s outsized role in the Netherlands’ housing crunch. A report released this week by the Economic Institute for Construction (EIB) found that migration accounted for about 60 percent of additional housing demand between 2015 and 2024. Migrants who arrived in that period occupied roughly 435,000 homes by 2024, out of nearly 700,000 homes added to the stock.
The 44 percent figure of social housing units occupied by first or second-generation immigrants has doubled from 22 percent in 2000, and is forecast to rise to 51 percent by 2030.
A total of 92 percent of Syrian first-generation immigrants reside in social housing. In addition, 90 percent of those born in Somalia, Afghanistan, and Eritrea reside in social housing.
Asylum-related migration contributes disproportionately to lasting demand because status holders remain permanently at high rates, unlike many labor or student migrants who leave within a decade.
Critics said the minister’s comments minimized the burdens on young Dutch adults who have already spent years on waiting lists for social housing or who face high private rents and purchase prices that lock them out of independent living.
Social housing waiting lists in major cities often stretch many years; priority rules for status holders allow some recent arrivals to bypass ordinary queues. Dutch population growth in recent years has been driven almost entirely by net migration, amplifying pressure on an already constrained housing market marked by strict planning rules, nitrogen regulations and slow construction.
Spanish trade unions representing millions of workers have announced a general strike for November 11. The announcement comes amid nationwide mobilizations for the right to housing and only days after Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez called early elections for November 29.
The strike was announced by the two largest union organizations, the General Union of Workers (UGT) and the Workers’ Commissions (Comisiones Obreras, CCOO), alongside the General Confederation of Labor (CGT), Basque unions ELA and LAB, and the Galician confederation CIG.
It will be the country’s first general strike in 14 years, excluding the feminist strike of March 8, 2018.
Housing and wages are the same struggle
“A key demand of this strike is to vindicate decent salaries to afford housing,” the Madrid Tenants Union wrote.
In their strike call, unions emphasized several demands that have been on their agenda for months. These include reductions in working hours, wage increases, health and safety measures in the workplace, eradicating precarious employment and progress in collective bargaining – a process that has been obstructed by employers for almost a year.
Yet, echoing the sentiment voiced on the streets, where hundreds of thousands have protested and erected encampments against a predatory housing system, the trade union call links all these demands to the right to housing.
“This is a strike with very clear foundations and labor demands,” CCOO’s Carlos Gutiérrez said. “Is it being called because working families cannot access affordable housing? Yes. But we cannot separate the inability to access affordable housing from the wage situation in our country and what is happening in the workplace.”
Maricarmen Abascal during a protest in June 2026. Source Sindicato de Inquilinas e Inquilinos de Madrid/Facebook
The general strike builds on a protest wave triggered by the eviction of 87-year-old Maricarmen Abascal in late September. After years of battle to keep the home she had been living in for 70 years, Abascal was carried out of the apartment on a stretcher. She remained hospitalized until Wednesday, October 7, when the Madrid Tenants Union announced her death.
“Although a historic agreement was reached that would have allowed her to return to her home, this solution came too late,” the organization wrote. “An absolutely avoidable situation, following an agonizing process.”
A strike against all who “do nothing to solve the housing crisis”
Many of those participating in the protests recognized that Sánchez’s administration failed to implement policies that would truly address the housing crisis. Yet union and civil society statements emphasize the problem goes much further than the behavior of a specific political option.
“It’s important to make clear that this is not a strike against any particular government, but against those who do nothing to solve the housing crisis, and also against the employers, who have kept the Agreement for Employment and Collective Bargaining (AENC) blocked for nearly a year,” Patricia Ruiz from UGT was quoted as saying in Público.
Political parties from the center-left to the left have largely expressed support for the strike. Even PSOE figures who share the responsibility for not addressing the housing crisis signaled support for concerns outlined by trade unions.
While a general strike held only a couple of weeks ahead of an election would usually spell trouble for the incumbent administration, local political analysts say this is a peculiar situation that could swing both ways.
Right-wing options are polling high, but ongoing housing mobilizations could steer the electoral campaign away from scapegoating migrants toward issues of social justice – topics they are generally keen to avoid.
Regulation could be the fastest response for tenants facing their next rent payment, Italian MEP Irene Tinagli said. Measures to moderate rent increases and restrict short-term rentals in neighbourhoods under the greatest pressure could help in the short to medium term.
“In the long term we need structural measures that provide a greater supply of affordable homes,” she told the European Newsroom (enr) on Wednesday. That would however require substantial investment and long-term planning, she added.
Tinagli, who chairs the European Parliament’s Special Committee on the Housing Crisis (HOUS), said residential property “has become an asset” and was increasingly attracting investors and real estate funds. These investors were buying entire buildings and evicting tenants or sharply raising rents, she said, describing a pattern seen in cities across the EU.
One such case was Maricarmen Abascal, whose eviction from her longtime Madrid home made her a symbol of Spain’s housing protests. She died in hospital at the age of 87 on October 7, two weeks after her eviction. She never returned home, despite an agreement with the apartment’s owner, Urbagestión, that would have allowed her to return at roughly her previous rent rate.
In the interview, conducted before news of Abascal’s death emerged, Tinagli described Abascal’s eviction as “a case that we are seeing in many other cities and countries across the European Union” and added: “It tells me that we need to do something.”
European tools, local action
While housing remains primarily a national and local responsibility, the EU could provide authorities with tools to act, alongside guidelines and parliamentary resolutions, Tinagli said.
She pointed to greater use of cohesion funds, “reprogramming them to address housing investments”, and more flexible state-aid rules to support social and affordable housing projects.
Work on an Affordable Housing Act, which the European Commission proposed last month, was intended to give authorities clearer criteria for restricting short-term rentals “where they are becoming increasingly invasive of the dynamics of the city,” the Italian politician said.
Such restrictions could range from limits on licences to outright bans, depending on local housing pressures. Reducing potential returns from holiday lets could curb investors’ interest in driving up property prices, she added.
Politicians need to solve the affordability crisis to stop the far-right, social democratic Portuguese prime minister Luís Montenegro told MEPs on Tuesday (6 October).
Opening a debate in Strasbourg, Montenegro called for more lax regulation as a way to address the housing crisis, defended strict migration policies, and expressed support for funding poorer regions in the next EU budget.
He also stressed the importance of lowering fuel prices and prioritising the energy transition to “solve the real problems that people wrestle with,” adding that “our response … has to be felt in the lives of Europeans” to avoid disappointed voters turning to populism and extremism.
Back at home, Montenegro has the far-right Chega (Enough) party on his tail: in the 2025 parliamentary elections, they won 23 percent of the ballots against the Montenegro alliance’s 33 percent.
Now, polls give Chega 27 percent of declared votes for the next parliament, slightly less than the Socialist Party (28 percent) and ahead of the current government coalition (24 percent).
For his part, a Chega MEP (Patriots for Europe), António Tânger Corrêa, challenged Montenegro on Tuesday for relying on wind and solar energy without enough storage in case of blackouts and shutting down coal power plants.
He also warned Montenegro against agreeing to limit unanimous votes in the European Council in future, as representing a blow to Portugal’s sovereign powers.
From his left-wing opponents, Portuguese MEP Catarina Martins pointed out the high rent costs in the country and criticised the government for failing to support low-earning tenants.
Montenegro said his government simplified the law around housing construction – much in line with the EU’s focus on deregulation – and proposed tax breaks to encourage investors to build more.
An EU-level policy complementing it “would be very useful,” he said, as long as it simplified existing regulations.
The Affordable Housing Act presented by the EU Commission in early September aims to improve the market for tenants by restricting short-term rentals.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced a snap election for late November after two housing bills were defeated in a parliamentary vote on Friday, October 2. The bills came amid widespread mass mobilizations demanding urgent action on the country’s housing crisis, following the eviction of an 87-year-old woman in Madrid.
Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets of approximately 50 cities over the weekend in support of these demands.
“It is true that there are still many injustices to correct, many social goals to achieve, and many problems to solve – above all in the areas of inequality, public services, and access to housing,” Sánchez said in his speech on Monday, as he appealed to voters to give progressive forces more decisive electoral support to allow them to implement reforms more easily.
Real estate speculation drives housing crisis
While Sánchez’s administration has profiled itself as one of the more progressive governments in Europe in terms of international policy, national movements remain frustrated by the lack of decisiveness it has approached making changes at home – including in housing policy.
For years, tenants unions have been warning against the different ways house-owners, particularly real estate speculation funds, have exacerbated housing insecurity for the general population.
Existing anger spilled over as Maricarmen Abascal, an elderly tenant in Madrid, faced eviction from the home she had lived in for 70 years. After the development company Urbagestión Desarrollo e Inversión SL acquired the house Abascal lived in, they imposed a 275% rent increase that she was not able to meet, leading, after a lengthy legal process, to her eviction at the end of last month.
The mobilizations that followed addressed a wider set of problems. “Maricarmen’s situation reflects a housing model that prioritizes real estate profits while abandoning the very people who built our neighborhoods over the decades,” Madrid Tenants’ Union (Sindicato de Inquilinas e Inquilinos de Madrid) warned.
“Most serious of all is that this situation cannot be understood without considering the weight of laws inherited from the Franco regime that denied women basic rights,” the union emphasized in May. “The original contract was signed solely by Maricarmen’s father because the legal system of the time rendered women invisible within the family. Had that same contract been signed today, both parents would have been named as holders, and Maricarmen would remain fully protected.”
“Yet an extremely restrictive interpretation of the regulations has ultimately weighed more heavily than social reality, than the desire to protect those who rent, and more than seventy years of roots in a neighborhood,” they added. “For the Madrid Tenants’ Union, the position is clear: no formalistic interpretation of the law can justify evicting an 87-year-old woman from the home where she has lived her entire life simply to boost the profitability of a real estate investment.”
Unions promise building general strike for housing
The protests formulated several demands to the government, including a ban on eviction of vulnerable tenants where alternative housing is not available; a limit to short-term and room rentals; a rent freeze; and an extension for contracts ending in 2026 and 2027.
Such demands were generally by the public, as well as by trade unions. “Housing and work are not separate struggles,” unions wrote, pledging to work towards a general strike for housing. “The rise in rents is a direct transfer of wealth from the working class to rentierism. Our wages end up, month after month, in the pockets of the rentiers who control our homes.”
The uproar pushed Sánchez’s government to reflect these demands in two bills it presented to parliament. Most considered this a significant breakthrough for the housing movement despite the official texts not fully corresponding to the protesters’ vocabulary and the vote taking place on two separate proposals.
Watered down or not, right-wing and far-right parties voted against both bills.
“We have a democracy held hostage by rentiers and speculators,” the progressive party Podemos wrote as protests rolled out over the weekend. “The housing mobilization must keep growing and move toward a general strike until the speculators and those who defend them in the institutions have nowhere left to hide.”
“Between now and November 29, the voices of all of us who want peace must be heard,” Irene Montero from Podemos added after the snap election announcement. “Those of us who want our sons and daughters to avoid war and to have healthcare and education, instead of money being spent on weapons; who want homes to live in; who want jobs and time to spend with our loved ones; and who want the cost of living to go down.”
Across the West, native Europeans are dying out but rental prices continue to go up every year. While the left would like to point the finger at capitalists and greedy landlords, the primary factor driving the housing affordability crisis is mass immigration.
Berlin is a prime example of this trend, as German journalist and author Jens Winter pointed out on X using clear population and housing data.
“Rental prices on the market have more than doubled in Berlin since 2011—plenty of money for corporations. But where is the increased demand coming from? While the native population of the capital has declined by 260,000 since 2011, the number of foreigners and people with a migration background has risen by 650,000 over the same period. That means: Without migration, there would be less demand for housing in Berlin today than in 2011,” he wrote.
In a follow-up post, he wrote that the German “conservative” party is just as guilty as the left.
“The CDU-aligned real estate lobby is raking in big money with migration in Berlin. The Germans have a choice: dying out in the CDU’s multikulti capitalism or in the Left’s multikulti socialism. Understandable response: If we’re going to disappear anyway, why bust our asses for it?” he wrote.
Die CDU-nahe Immobilien-Lobby scheffelt mit Migration in Berlin mächtig Geld. Die Deutschen haben die Wahl: Aussterben im Multikulti-Kapitalismus der CDU oder im Multikulti-Sozialismus der Linken. Verständliche Antwort: Wenn schon verschwinden, warum dafür dann hart arbeiten? https://t.co/GPrTp62SXO
While the doubling of rents is real, there is a basic supply and demand reality that the left would like to deny. It is indeed true that predatory property owners, major institutional players, and money printing have played contributing roles to the housing crisis, but no matter how many greedy property owners are involved, if the population of a city falls, rental and housing prices are almost inevitably going to fall.
Mass immigration means that population numbers never fall. Any breathing space for German families to repopulate, have more children, and fill in the gaps left by older generations passing away is immediately filled by hundreds of thousands of foreigners.
The data shows that the population of native Germans fell by 260,000 people. In a system that rejects mass immigration and foreign real estate investors, this could have been a boon for birthrates and increasing home ownership. For one, Germans who already lived in Berlin, and those looking to move to Berlin, would have been more easily able to afford rents and housing due to less competition on the housing market. Secondly, more native Germans would have had a chance to start families — and those who already had families could have afforded an extra child or two — by securing affordable housing.
However, Germany does not reject mass immigration.
There is of course another solution, but it is far more complicated than simply allowing population levels to fall in a country that has never had so many people living in it. Instead of ending mass immigration, left-wing parties, along with the CDU, demand more housing is built.
However, there are myriad reasons why the required housing is not being built, including high construction and material costs, red tape, zoning, and a lack of skilled workers. The same parties have been making the same demands for years now, but construction cannot keep pace with demand in Berlin or other major cities across Germany.
The Left Party may promise to build more, but the reality is that it will not happen. Nothing the left offers will lead to the necessary building. Before Olaf Scholz of the far-left Social Democrats (SPD) won the chancellorship, he promised that his “goal” was to create 400,000 new apartments per year, which would include 100,000 units of social housing, saying, “That’s not witchcraft, we just have to want to do it.”
It never happened under Scholz and it won’t happen under a left-wing government in Berlin either.
Should more housing even be built?
As Western cities race to replace their native European populations, the question becomes whether life really becomes better in a crowded multicultural city when it means more traffic, longer waiting times at hospitals, crowded classrooms, and imported crime — just to name a few ills.
The newcomers also did not fix the skilled worker shortage that could potentially build all the homes and apartments politicians and lobbyists claim Europe needs. While a certain number of new houses and apartments always need to be built, the question then becomes should Western civilization really be involved in endless building to accommodate millions of foreigners.
On top of all of these questions, the buildings developers managed to build are now in fact uglier than ever, more expensive than ever, and are built more slowly than ever.
Winter’s X post is especially relevant given that the Left Party recently won a first place finish in Berlin elections, securing over 25 percent of the vote. Commentators and analysts have contributed the rise of the party in Germany’s capital due a variety of factors, but two major components are the party’s ability to secure the vote of German citizens with a migration background and young voters.
The second factor is Berlin’s housing crisis, which helped drive support from groups like non-voters, the young, and foreigners.
German taxpayer-funded Deutsche Welle, wrote: “That makes sense to 17-year-old Liska, who voted for the socialists: ‘The Left Party did appeal to me, especially because of the social issues — getting prices down, making rents more affordable.’ Rents in Berlin are indeed rising at a massive pace — by some 7% in the last two years alone — and first-time tenants are likely to be the hardest hit. Polls also showed that by far the biggest proportion of Berlin voters — 37% — thought that the Left Party was the most likely to create affordable housing.”
Again, the same story is taking place in the Netherlands, with the natural population increase for the Dutch at near zero or negative. Nevertheless, the population rose from about 16.8 million in 2013 to 18.1 million in 2025, with net migration accounting for virtually all of the recent increase.
It must also be remembered that just like in Germany, most of these migrants want to head to the major cities, such as Amsterdam.
Official housing-need forecasts in the Netherlands also attribute a large share of future extra demand, often 45 percent or more of the extra dwellings required, to population growth that is itself 95 percent migration-driven.
Great for landlords, bad for the citizens.
Of course, the Alternative for Germany has tried to tie the housing crisis to mass immigration, and they have successfully made this case to some extent.
WATCH: Mass immigration is fueling the West's housing crisis.
Here's how it's happening in Germany.
In a powerful speech in the German Bundestag, @AfD politician Carolin Bachmann slams the ruling government for allowing 2 million migrants into the country while families… pic.twitter.com/DMEqiV316S
The problem is that as more and more of the population becomes foreign, this argument holds less and less sway. Immigration may raise housing prices but if immigration brought a person to a country in the first place, and if more immigration might also enable more and more of their family members and fellow countrymen to arrive, then these voters have every incentive to keep immigration levels high regardless of housing costs.
Many of these migrants are not paying for rent anyway. There are millions of foreigners on social welfare, which means not only are they taking housing places of native Germans, but they are being paid to do it. They then often have far higher birthrates than native Germans, even with limited space, which entitles them to larger spaces.
The cycle is self-reinforcing and relentless. That means unless dramatic action is taken against mass immigration, housing and rental prices may never truly come down.
The Christian Democratic Union (CDU) has continued its downward spiral after suffering significant losses in state elections in Berlin and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania on Sunday, September 20. In addition to coming second to the progressive Die Linke in the German capital, Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s party failed to achieve the 5% needed to enter Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania’s parliament, marking a new low – or, in Merz’s own words – a “disaster.”
The results of the two elections were radically different: in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) won the largest percentage of votes, echoing, in many ways, the recent outcome in Saxony-Anhalt. In Berlin, Die Linke emerged as the winner, claiming a quarter of the vote after a campaign focusing on housing, the cost of living crisis, and public transport.
Part of the local reports note that while the AfD and Die Linke lie on opposite ends of the political spectrum, both gained ground thanks to the perception that they bring the best chance of breaking with the policies implemented by the government coalition between CDU and the Social Democrats (SPD).
These policies – pursuing extensive cuts to the social and welfare system and attacks on labor rights in order to fund a massive rearmament drive – have completely eroded the support for Merz’s conservatives. Despite this administration’s unprecedented unpopularity, the German Chancellor is showing no sign of changing course, stating after Sunday’s election that “reforms must come.”
Die Linke’s Berlin result: reforms must be implemented – but which reforms?
Reforms must be implemented, voters in several German states apparently agree with Merz – just not those envisioned by the CDU. Die Linke’s campaign, led by Elif Eralp, offered an alternative list of policy reforms addressing Berlin’s inhabitants’ most pressing concerns. This meant a focus on accessible housing – including a follow-up on the 2021 referendum where voters backed expropriating the property of private real-estate companies with 3,000 or more units in the city.
Five years ago, over one million people supported the referendum’s idea of socializing the housing pool, yet no action was taken by the local administration. Since then, the housing situation has grown worse, leading to widespread frustration. Die Linke’s campaign recognized the general discontent and promised it would not give up on socialization.
“Die Linke’s successful campaign in Berlin was driven by its strong focus on affordable housing and rent control, which resonated deeply with voters facing massively rising living costs,” Kirsten Schubert, a general practitioner active in the party’s local chapter, told BreakThrough News. “The party integrated large-scale door-to-door campaigning strategy, allowing volunteers to connect personally with hundreds of thousands of residents directly at their doorsteps. By those means, strong social media presence and a huge range of community activities, they successfully mobilized a diverse coalition of non-voters, progressive urban youth, and traditional working-class voters.”
Krunoslav Stojaković, a political advisor at the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, says that the election result commits not only Die Linke, but also “the social left and all those who care about a more just society” to work towards achieving socialization of housing. “At this point, there can be no going back […] The people of Berlin have given us this mandate.”
“There will be resistance,” he emphasizes. “Potential coalition partners are only tentatively supportive of Die Linke, and some are already making demands against the socialization of those profiting from the housing crisis as a condition for political cooperation.”
Progressive measures to face opposition from center
The approach adopted in Berlin marked a welcome break from Die Linke’s campaigning in other states. Stojaković pointed out to the portal H-alter that the party’s earlier choices – such as joining coalitions that implemented austerity measures – contributed to a fall in popularity. The recent success offers an opportunity to reclaim lost ground and reshape the party’s approach to fieldwork. But it should not be taken for granted that this will happen.
For now, the party faces talks with potential coalition partners SPD and the Greens. Figures from both parties signaled there are significant misalignments between them and Die Linke. While the SPD does not share the commitment to socialization of housing, the Greens’ Franziska Brantner said the party would not cooperate with “anti-semites from Neukölln.” With this, Brantner indicated that the political mainstream in Germany will persist in pressuring those criticizing Israel – even if this criticism remains timid at best.
On the other hand, left and progressive parties across Europe recognized in Die Linke’s result an important rupture within the predominating context of the far right gaining electoral ground. From Jean-Luc Mélenchon in France to Slovenia’s Levica, reactions emphasized the significance of shaping grounded and unequivocally left programs. “Politics begins with the daily problems of millions of people,” wrote Peter Mertens, General Secretary of the Workers’ Party of Belgium (PTB-PVDA). “It is not just about talking about tenants and workers, but about organizing them so they can impose change themselves.”
This article was updated on Wednesday, September 23, to incorporate comments from Kirsten Schubert.
In this personal essay at The New Yorker, Anna Holmes writes about growing up in Davis, California, a college town near Sacramento; the financial challenges her mixed-race family faced; and what it means to come from a family without the generational wealth that can make homeownership, and the financial security that comes with it, possible.
It’s hard to hear people who own property grumble about how little money they have. One friend who regularly moans about money has a four-bedroom home on the West Coast and a vacation house in New England. I’m unmoved by the financial lamentations of another friend, who owns a town house in New York with an apartment for a nanny or an in-law. Stuff like this makes me want to scream. Demonstratesomemodicumofself-awareness!Read the fucking room! When a friend told me that her parents were going to help her buy a second home, I made a pointed remark that it must be nice to have access to that sort of capital. She conceded the point, graciously, and we moved on.
Westminster is the most unaffordable city for local homebuyers, according to a September 2026 real estate report. While home price growth across the UK slowed to 2% a year, a new study by Everest Mortgages looked at the cities where house prices and mortgage requirements are still too high for their own residents. Westminster makes it the most difficult for residents to buy a home, with locals needing to earn over 3 times more than they do currently. Salaries and mortgage requirements don’t match each other the most in England, as the region takes all top 10 spots.Chichester stands out with the lowest local salaries, and full-time workers there earn only £35.2K annually.
For each of 75+ UK cities, the study focused on two key numbers: the salary local workers would need to afford a home versus what they earn now. The first figure was calculated using the average house price without the deposit (15%) and what lenders usually limit for mortgage applications, taken as 4.5 times the salary. The aimed salary is then compared to the actual median salary in the region, highlighting the affordability gaps in the UK housing market. Here’s how the top 10 most unaffordable housing markets for locals.
In Westminster, residents need to earn over 3 times more than they do now to afford a home. This is the largest difference in the country between real income and what lenders are looking for when approving mortgages, and, in raw numbers, it’s a gap of £108K annually. Right now, Westminster workers take home around £52.6K a year if they’re working full time, but with house prices at £854K, they need to triple their earnings. Chichester Chichester is the second most unaffordable market for residents, with local salaries requiring a 2.3 times increase to match the mortgage conditions. In 2026, workers here earn only £35.2K annually, the lowest median salary in the top 10, but the house prices in Chichester are still higher than in Bath, Bristol, or Brighton and Hove.
To pay off a mortgage on a £430K house, residents need to earn £81.2K, more than double their current paychecks. London In third place is London, where the median earnings of £46.4K still need to be more than doubled (x 2.25) to fit the mortgage payment schedule. The average house in London is actually cheaper than one in Westminster or in St Albans, with a price tag of £554K, but local salaries need to reach at least £104.6K, the third-highest required paycheck on the list. St Albans St Albans follows closely, with a 2.14 times salary increase required. Local workers already make the most on the list, bringing home £57.4K, over £10K more than in London, but these salaries are still not enough for a safe mortgage.
With house prices sitting at £651.4K on average, St Albans homebuyers are looking for a salary of £123K. Oxford Oxford also makes the list of the cities where it’s the hardest to buy a home on local salaries. In 2026, the gap between the actual paychecks and what lenders are looking for is £44.9K, which is already more than a median Oxford salary. Currently, the income for one full-time worker amounts to £43.3K annually, so future homebuyers need to look to double their earnings. A housing expert from Everest Mortgages commented on the study: “Many first-time buyers spend years saving a deposit, only to discover their salary still disqualifies them for a mortgage on the property they've been saving toward. Having a big enough deposit is only half the story, and a stable, sufficiently large income is equally important. In Westminster and Chichester, the deposit hurdle is real, but the income gap is the wall most buyers never get over.”
The European Commission calls it the Affordable Housing Act and says it can “truly bring a change in people’s lives”. But how much will it actually do to make housing more affordable, asks Catherine Feore?
The tension at the heart of the proposal is that Brussels is making ambitious claims about tackling the housing crisis while simultaneously making clear that it is not imposing new housing policies on governments or cities.
Commission President Ursula von der Leyen says the measure fulfils a promise to tackle housing affordability, describing it as “one step in this direction” and declaring: “Today, we are delivering for all Europeans.” Housing Commissioner Dan Jørgensen went further, saying the Act gives governments and cities tools to “make more affordable homes available”.
Yet the proposed legislation itself is considerably more cautious. The Commission acknowledges that insufficient housing supply is the structural cause of the affordability crisis. Short-term rentals, second homes and other non-primary uses are not the root problem, although they can exacerbate shortages and push up prices in already constrained markets.
Housing stress test
The Act principally delivers a common legal framework for authorities that choose to intervene.
Central to this is a new EU test for housing stress. An area would normally qualify where an average home costs at least eight years of disposable per-capita income, that ratio has increased over the previous decade, and pressures are unlikely to ease over the next three years. At a ratio of ten or more, the historical deterioration test is dropped. Population dynamics, housing supply and demand must also be assessed.
Authorities could then restrict short-term rentals outside a host’s primary residence or tackle second homes, prolonged vacancy and certain other non-primary uses. But there is no obligation. They must also demonstrate that the activity has significantly harmed housing affordability or availability for at least three years, and any restriction must be targeted, necessary and proportionate. This seems to set a high bar of evidence for most local authorities.
Currently, local authorities must notify the Commission of short-term rental restrictions under the Services Directive. That notification requirement will no longer be required. Cities can use the new framework without seeking prior Commission approval, although measures must be published and remain open to legal challenge. Officials argue this will remove a burdensome procedure and make intervention easier.
But the Commission is equally explicit about what it is not doing. The Act does not regulate rents, harmonise housing policy, give Brussels new housing competences, dictate taxation, inheritance or planning, or require, recommend or encourage authorities to impose restrictions. Housing policy choices “remain national, regional and local”.
Executive Vice-President Teresa Ribera says that when markets fail to provide affordable homes, “public authorities have a responsibility to act”. But the Act does not compel that action; it provides a stronger legal framework if authorities choose to act independently.
Its impact could be real in tourist hotspots where non-primary housing use is demonstrably worsening shortages. But it cannot itself build a home or lower a rent. The question is whether a clearer legal toolbox matches the expectations created by the Commission’s promise to tackle Europe’s housing crisis. When asked to quantify how much of a difference the new provisions could make, the Commission couldn’t give precise figures, saying that it would depend on the measures adopted.
America’s elders need more places to live, but even in liberal enclaves that recognize the problem, developers are facing fierce foes: America’s elders. Make it make sense! Charley Locke reports from her hometown of Oakland, California, where boomers are organizing against two proposals that would add 618 market-rate residential units to the city’s senior housing stock:
Many in the crowd had been marching against governmental and corporate overreach for half a century: against the Vietnam draft and the invasion of Iraq; against Wall Street; against police brutality. They’re part of a generational force that’s antiestablishment and suspicious of power. But in this fight, it wasn’t so clear who the establishment was or who had the power. Were these righteous middle-class activists fending off greedy developers who would charge high rents, or were they wealthy seniors prioritizing neighborhood character over ameliorating the housing crisis? Were they once again David, or had they become Goliath?
“Most people don’t get to buy their old homes back, or ever step foot in them again, and that’s okay. But we sure can spend a lifetime trying to re-create them.” In this poignant essay for Dwell, Emilia Petrarca celebrates the work of her late father, the New York City architect John Petrarca, and explores how his influence has shaped her own relationship to home and interior design. Petrarca reflects on the process of finding her own aesthetic while carrying her father’s with her, considering the ways belongings and spaces can hold our memories, legacies, and grief.
When I moved out of my mom’s house and into my first apartment with a roommate at 23, I brought with me a black rug my dad bought in Morocco. After graduating from Carnegie Mellon, he joined the Peace Corps and spent time in Ouarzazate designing government buildings. In a room full of cheap Ikea furniture, it was the only thing that truly felt like a reflection of me. Well, that and a rigid, plastic, yellow outdoor chair I for some reason bought to go with my desk. Looking back at photos now, I see that the choice makes more sense: The chair my dad got me for my room in the Big House was almost the exact same hue.
You don’t have to live in El Cerrito, California, or have ever used Nextdoor, for this essay to resonate. For Oakland Review of Books, Amy Brown recounts buying her first home in the East Bay city and swiftly becoming the villain of her local Nextdoor—after her uncharitable Bluesky posts about the seniors opposing a library tax made their way back to her neighbors. Honest and funny, Brown’s essay explores being locally online—that weird, often uncomfortable place between online and IRL—and shows how (not) to talk to people you’ll run into at the grocery store.
Still, I spent multiple nights lying awake, thinking that everyone in this town must know I’m a bitch now. My son is supposed to start TK at the public school in the fall. What if his classmates’ parents use Nextdoor? What if the nice lady across the street who organizes a monthly dinner for our block uses Nextdoor? What if my neighbor already told everyone that the woman who moved into the house on the corner is an asshole? Does everyone I see on the street think I’m an asshole? Can they tell I don’t belong here? Do I have to go crawling back to my hometown and get a job at the car seat manufacturing plant?
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