Across Spain, tens of thousands march to protest the growing housing crisis

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Tens of thousands of Spaniards marched in protests held across the European country on Saturday in anger over high housing costs with no relief in sight.

Government authorities said that 15,000 marched in Madrid, while organizers said 10 times that many took to the streets of the capital. In Barcelona, the city hall said 12,000 people took part in the protest, while organizers claimed over 100,000 did.

The massive demonstration of social angst that is a major concern for Spain's left-wing government and town halls was organized by housing activists and backed by Spain’s main labor unions.

The housing crisis has hit particularly hard in Spain, where there is a strong tradition of home ownership and scant public housing for rent. Rents have been driven up by increased demand. Buying a home has become unaffordable for many, with market pressures and speculation driving up prices, especially in big cities and coastal areas.

A generation of young people say they have to stay with their parents or spend big just to share an apartment, with little chance of saving enough to one day purchase a home. High housing costs mean even those with traditionally well-paying jobs are struggling to make ends meet.

“I’m living with four people and still, I allocate 30 or 40% of my salary to rent,” said Mari Sánchez, a 26-year-old lawyer in Madrid. “That doesn’t allow me to save. That doesn’t allow me to do anything. It doesn’t even allow me to buy a car. That’s my current situation, and the one many young people are living through.”

Housing Minister Isabel Rodríguez said on X that “I share the demand of the numerous people who have marched today: that homes are for living in and not for speculating."

The average rent in Spain has almost doubled in the last 10 years. The price per square meter rose from 7.2 euros ($7.90) in 2014 to 13 euros last year, according to real estate website Idealista. The increase is bigger in Madrid and Barcelona.

Incomes have failed to keep up despite Spain's recent economic boom, especially for younger people in a country with chronically high unemployment.

Spain does not have the public housing that other European nations have invested in to cushion struggling renters from a market that is pricing them out.

Spain is near the bottom end of Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries with public housing for rent making up under 2% of all available housing. The OECD average is 7%. In France it is is 14%, Britain 16% and the Netherlands 34%.

Angry renters point to instances of international hedge funds buying up properties, often with the aim of renting them to foreign tourists. The question has become so politically charged that Barcelona’s city government pledged last year to phase out all its 10,000 permits for short-term rentals, many of them advertised on platforms like Airbnb, by 2028.

Marchers in Madrid on Saturday chanted “Get Airbnb out of our neighborhoods" and held up signs against short-term rentals. In Barcelona, someone carried a sign reading “I am not leaving, vampire," apparently in a message to would-be real estate speculator seeking to drive him out of his home.

The central government's biggest initiative for curbing the cost of housing is a rent cap mechanism it has offered to regional authorities, based on a price index established by the housing ministry. The government says the measure has slightly reduced rents in Barcelona, one of the few areas it has been applied.

But government measures have not proven enough to stop protests over the past two years. Experts say the situation likely won't improve anytime soon.

“This is not the first, nor will it be the last, (housing protest) given the severity of the housing crisis,” Ignasi Martí, professor with the Esade business school and head of its Dignified Housing Observatory, said in an email.

“We saw this with the financial crisis (of 2008-2012) when (a protest movement) lasted until there was a certain economic recovery and a reduction in the social tension," Marti added.

People gather during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Barcelona, Spain, Saturday, April 5, 2025. The sign says "I'm not leaving vampire". (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

People gather during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Barcelona, Spain, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

A girl holds a banner reading "housing killing" as people gather during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Barcelona, Spain, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

People gather during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Barcelona, Spain, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

People gather during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Barcelona, Spain, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

People gather during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Barcelona, Spain, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

A demonstrator looks out from a hole in a banner with a painting of a house and a key during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Madrid, Spain, Saturday April 5, 2025. Message reads'Housing union Tetuan' (district of Madrid). (AP Photo/Paul White)

People depicting bankers march during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Madrid, Spain, Saturday April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Paul White)

People march during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Madrid, Spain, Saturday April 5, 2025. Main banners read 'Rents impossible, rights for housing. Rights for a roof.' (AP Photo/Paul White)

People march with a flag depicting a rich banker during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Madrid, Spain, Saturday April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Paul White)

People march during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Madrid, Spain, Saturday April 5, 2025. Main banner reads 'Lower the prices.' (AP Photo/Paul White)

A man crosses the street in front of a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Madrid, Spain, Saturday April 5, 2025. Banner reads ' Lower the prices. let's go for the rent strike' (AP Photo/Paul White)

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado comes to the White House on Thursday to discuss her country's future with President Donald Trump even after he publicly dismissed her credibility to take over after an audacious U.S. military raid captured then-President Nicolás Maduro.

Trump has raised doubts about his stated commitment to backing democratic rule in Venezuela. His administration has signaled its willingness to work with acting President Delcy Rodríguez, who was Maduro’s vice president and, along with others in the deposed leader’s inner circle, remains in charge of day-to-day governmental operations.

In endorsing Rodríguez so far, Trump has sidelined Machado, who has long been a face of resistance in Venezuela and sought to cultivate relationships with Trump and key administration voices like Secretary of State Marco Rubio among the American right wing in a gamble to ally herself with the U.S. government.

The White House says Machado sought the face-to-face meeting with Trump without setting expectations for what would occur. Her party is widely believed to have won 2024 elections rejected by Maduro. Machado previously offered to share with Trump the Nobel Peace Prize she won last year, an honor he has coveted.

Machado plans to have a meeting at the Senate following her lunch with Trump, who has called her “a nice woman” while indicating they might not touch on major issues in their talks Thursday.

Her Washington swing began after U.S. forces in the Caribbean Sea seized another sanctioned oil tanker that the Trump administration says had ties to Venezuela. It is part of a broader U.S. effort to take control of the South American country’s oil after U.S. forces seized Maduro and his wife at a heavily guarded compound in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas and brought them to New York to stand trial on drug trafficking charges.

The White House says Venezuela has been fully cooperating with the Trump administration since Maduro’s ouster.

Rodríguez, the acting president, herself has adopted a less strident position toward Trump and his “America First” policies toward the Western Hemisphere, saying she plans to continue releasing prisoners detained under Maduro — a move thought to have been made at the behest of the Trump administration. Venezuela released several Americans this week.

Trump, a Republican, said Wednesday that he had a “great conversation” with Rodríguez, their first since Maduro was ousted.

“We had a call, a long call. We discussed a lot of things,” Trump said during an Oval Office bill signing. “And I think we’re getting along very well with Venezuela.”

Even before indicating the willingness to work with Venezuela's interim government, Trump was quick to snub Machado. Just hours after Maduro's capture, Trump said of Machado that “it would be very tough for her to be the leader. She doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country.”

Machado has steered a careful course to avoid offending Trump, notably after winning last year’s Nobel Peace Prize, which Trump wanted to win himself. She has since thanked Trump. Her offer to share the peace prize with him was rejected by the Nobel Institute.

Machado’s whereabouts have been largely unknown since she went into hiding early last year after being briefly detained in Caracas. She briefly reappeared in Oslo, Norway, in December after her daughter received the Nobel Peace Prize on her behalf.

The industrial engineer and daughter of a steel magnate began challenging the ruling party in 2004, when the nongovernmental organization she co-founded, Súmate, promoted a referendum to recall then-President Hugo Chávez. The initiative failed, and Machado and other Súmate executives were charged with conspiracy.

A year later, she drew the anger of Chávez and his allies again for traveling to Washington to meet President George W. Bush. A photo showing her shaking hands with Bush in the Oval Office lives in the collective memory. Chávez considered Bush an adversary.

Almost two decades later, she marshaled millions of Venezuelans to reject Chávez’s successor, Maduro, for another term in the 2024 election. But ruling party-loyal electoral authorities declared him the winner despite ample credible evidence to the contrary. Ensuing anti-government protests ended in a brutal crackdown by state security forces.

Garcia Cano reported from Caracas, Venezuela, and Janetsky from Mexico City. AP Diplomatic Writer Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.

FILE - U.S. President George Bush, right, meets with Maria Corina Machado, executive director of Sumate, a non-governmental organization that defends Venezuelan citizens' political rights, in the Oval Office of the White House, Washington, May 31, 2005. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak, File)

FILE - Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado gestures to supporters during a protest against President Nicolas Maduro the day before his inauguration for a third term, in Caracas, Venezuela, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos, file)