It’s actually worth stepping back a bit because everyone has a cause and everyone has a solution. Short term lets, landlords, corporate investors, foreign inve

It’s actually worth stepping back a bit because everyone has a cause and everyone has a solution. Short term lets, landlords, corporate investors, foreign investors, property speculators, immigrants… are all soaking up the supply of housing and pricing locals out of an area! Fix it by banning the lot of it! The other argument is always that none of that really matters, just build more houses okay? Millions of ‘em. Deregulate, reform planning, do whatever it takes. Looking at the bigger picture you’d want to tackle both the demand and supply side. Housing is for living in, not investment, so disincentivise foreign investment, corporate landlords, buy to let, etc. and basically make it less attractive than other forms of investment. This would help in a city like Barcelona because housing density is already high and frees up existing supply that can be occupied by locals once more. You might find a place in Poble Nou or Gracia again instead of having to trek out past Sant Cugat. Similarly, houses need to be built and in many cases NIMBYism or planning regulation gets in the way of that. But another challenge is building the workforce to build not just the homes but the town infrastructure around them, as well as the incentives for businesses to do that as you say. If you don’t tackle the issue on both the demand and supply side at the same time then I feel like you just end up where we are now, where lots of houses and flats are built but either unaffordable or snapped up by the wealth class as an asset.