The Administrative Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Balearic Islands (TSJIB) upholds the government’s housing law that allows the expropriation of empty flats in the hands of vulture funds and large property owners (such as banks.)

To be specific, the TSJIB rejected the appeal of the ‘Association of Real Estate Developers of the Balearic Islands’ (Proinba) against Decree 36/2019 of 10 May, which regulates the vacancy regime and the procedure for compulsory transfer by these Large Property Owners. With this judgment of 19 January 2022, the Court upheld the measures taken by the Balearic Government in relation to the expropriation or temporary transfer of use of the unoccupied dwellings of Large Property Owners.

‘Proinba’ sought the annulment of the said decree. On appeal, the association argued that the decree was void because the third draft, which was eventually adopted, was not submitted for re-information to the public. The court does not consider it necessary to repeat the hearing procedure because the wording of Article 18(1) was already included in the second draft that was submitted to the public.

Similarly, the court assumes that the amendment of Article 9 of the Municipal Leases Act does not constitute a substantial change to the entire ordinance, as required by case law in these cases. Political representatives of the Balearic government have welcomed the ruling. We are aware that housing is not a market product, but an essential good, as it is the indispensable basis for the personal and family development of citizens. We will continue this policy with the expropriation of housing that has been vacant for years. This will allow us to alleviate one of the main problems we currently have in the Balearic Islands: access to adequate housing for the young population”. This was said by the vice-president of the government and judge on leave, Yllanes Suárez (from the extreme left party ‘Podemos’)