This project was a finalist in the European Responsible Housing Awards 2022 under the ‘Building strategic alliances, fostering community participation’, organised by Housing Europe, the International Union of Tenants and DELPHIS.
Organisation: Institut municipal de l’ habitatge i rehabilitacio’ de Barcelona (IMHAB).
Goals
Barcelona’s Framework Agreement between the City and the social and cooperative housing sector (also known as “Conveni ESAL”) seeks to increase the supply of permanently affordable housing in the city while developing a shared governance structure that allows for increased resident involvement in the design and management of the housing stock.
Increase the affordable housing supply:
The Framework Agreement has set a goal to develop 1,000 units in 10 years on public land. The tenure mix (60% rentals, 40% cooperative) will contribute to diversifying the supply of affordable housing and provide housing opportunities to different household types, all of them selected from the City’s official housing applicant registry.
Permanent affordability:
Public land is provided in long-term leasehold and therefore remains public and permanently affordable. The housing providers have also committed to reinvesting at least 50% of their future profits in new projects within the Framework Agreement.
Shared governance:
This initiative also intends to speed up affordable housing construction and foster cooperation among housing providers by means of a public land allocation process that is based on consensus rather than competition among housing providers.
Social housing sector consolidation:
The Framework Agreement also provides an opportunity for the social housing sector to build up its capacities and become a relevant actor in the provision of affordable housing in Barcelona and beyond.
Context
Spain is among the European countries with the least social and affordable housing, below 1.5% of the total housing stock. In Barcelona, housing rents have been rapidly increasing in the past few years and are already well above pre-crisis levels. Barcelona has seen a major shift in housing policies since the adoption of the City’s Right to Housing Plan 2016-2025.
One of the initiatives adopted by the Plan is the construction of more than 500 zero-equity cooperative housing units on public land through long-term leaseholds. This model differs from the traditional cooperative housing model in Spain, which grants cooperative members individual ownership of the housing units once housing construction is complete. The City of Barcelona partners with non-profit housing providers, including housing cooperatives, by providing public land to build on. The allocation of plots was usually done through competitive public tenders, a lengthy process that slowed down housing production and challenged the principle of cooperation that inspires most of the participating entities, forcing them to compete with one another and generating frustration among prospective residents.
Barcelona City Council has launched a new strategy based on a Framework Agreement between the City, the Catalan Association of Social Housing Managers (GHS), the Federation of Cooperative Housing (FCHC), the Social and Solidarity Economy Network (XES), as well as the Social Housing Foundations Coordinator (Cohabitac). Through this agreement, the different partners work with each other to propose projects, one per plot, to the City, which will then evaluate them following the principles of non-accumulation, local linkages, and affordability. The City and the entity proposed for each project will then sign a long-term lease on the land.
The Framework Agreement also envisions the development of joint financing tools and foresees the creation of an entity similar to a Community Land Trust that will allow to establish co-governance dynamics between the City Council, the housing providers and the resident population.
There are currently 4 zero-equity cooperatives built on public land in Barcelona. 2 more are currently under construction, while another 3 have already been allocated a plot of public land.
What is innovative about this project?
The Framework Agreement between the City and non-profit housing developers is the first of its kind in Spain and it represents the first public-community partnership in affordable housing.
From a public procurement perspective, the Framework reaches a balance between ensuring transparency and equal treatment among housing providers and giving them security and predictability to plan. This allows to shorten administrative procedures and reduce transaction costs.
The project selection criteria include:
- Speed and industrialisation in construction or rehabilitation.
- Technical and financial standing.
- Affordable rents and fees.
- Avoiding the concentration of projects around a few developers.
- Climate emergency criteria.
- Promotion of community links.
The Framework also sets the basis for the development of a Community Land Trust, which will eventually also include residents in the governance structure.
Interventions
The policy tools used as part of the Framework Agreement include:
- Framework Agreement (Conveni) to allocate public land.
- 99-year leasehold (Dret de Superfície) on public land.
- Affordable housing income thresholds and criteria apply to all projects under the Framework Agreement.
- Public financing (ICO, ICF) negotiated with the intermediation of the city
- City returnable grants (7% for most projects, 16% for projects smaller than 15 units and all renovation projects)
- State subsidy (300€/sqm).
- Tax deductions.
Waiver of on-site parking requirements
Impact
The Framework Agreement has already allocated 14 plots of land or buildings to be renovated, accounting for 567 housing units. These projects include the first senior cooperative housing project in the city as well as a project devoted to people with disabilities.
Lessons learned.
- New governance tool to increase the supply of affordable housing, strongly embedded in the city´s “right to housing” policy approach.
- Public land is provided in long-term leasehold and therefore remains public and permanently affordable. The housing providers have also committed to reinvest at least 50% of their future profits in new projects within the framework.
- Project aimed at contrasting lengthy procedures, by speeding up of administrative processes while maintaining transparency and accountability.
