SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, 19 Jan. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Governing Council has definitively approved today, Thursday, the decree that will allow nearly 10,500 Canarian families who live as tenants in officially protected housing to access ownership of these houses.
The document was submitted to the Governing Council after approval at the end of December by the Canary Islands Advisory Council, which issued the mandatory opinion favorable to the decree promoted by the Department of Public Works, Transport and Housing of the Government of the Canary Islands.
This decree, which will enter into force after its publication in the BOC, will allow families living in public housing for more than 25 years to access their property in two cases: the first, those who are renting in a foreclosed house before the III Housing Plan (1996-1999), and the second, which are under a sale and purchase regime prior to the I Housing Plan (1988-1991). This decree will affect all homes classified as officially protected before 1996.
According to reports from the Executive, “the decree approved today is the first to be implemented by the Government of the Canary Islands in ten years and comes to fill the void and calm the uncertainty caused by previous governments in the tenants of these homes who wanted to access to their property and they could not since 2013”.
The Government, by means of this decree, will offer publicly promoted subsidized housing for sale, both from the Canary Islands Housing Institute (ICAVI) and from the public company Visocan, at the reference price that the homes had at the time of the adjudication. In addition, tenants are offered a 50% bonus on that reference price and, of the remaining 50% that tenants must pay, all rents already paid will be deducted.
The ICAVI, after today’s approval and its subsequent publication in the BOC, plans to start publishing the different calls throughout the month of February so that families who wish to do so, and meet the requirements, request ownership of the houses in which they live as tenants.
These calls will be published quarterly throughout 2023 until all the subsidized housing groups affected by the decree are completed. Once each of these calls is published, the residents of the groups included in them will have up to one year to apply for ownership of the home they live in as tenants.
With today’s approval, and its forthcoming entry into force, this decree fulfills one of the commitments made by the Government through the Pact for Decent Housing and in the Housing Plan for the Canary Islands 2020-2025, which is to provide families the acquisition of ownership of the homes they have been inhabiting for more than 25 years, either under lease or purchase.
Some 10,500 families from all over the Canary Islands who have already paid at least 35% of the rent for those who are on a rental basis and that were classified as protected before 1996, or half the price of the home that they have been paying monthly in the case of those who are property owners.
In addition, those who want to access the property must demonstrate that they habitually and permanently occupy the home for which they are awarded, that none of the members of the cohabitation unit own any other home, be up to date with the approved quota by the Administrative Board regarding the common expenses of the building, and that the home is insured with multi-risk home insurance.
