Second homes in Spain: socio-demographic and geographical profiles

Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, 2007

The aim of this paper is to connect two processes that have been analysed independently to date and that have characterised the housing experience of the Spanish population. On the one hand, the consequences induced by the high density of Spanish urban spaces on other spatial spheres of people's lives and on the other hand, the traditional presence and the recent expansion of second home possession. In this context, we will demonstrate that, in Spain, a strong statistical relationship has been established between the location of main dwellings in a very dense urban context and a greater probability of having second homes. This relationship is better known in the scientific literature as the 'compensation hypothesis'.

2014

This article addresses the relationship between population and housing in Spain by using an interpretative approach based on demographic techniques. The main aims are to ascertain the rapid recent development in the Spanish housing system, and to explore how it will fare in the near future. To do so, some arguments are presented for the need to analyse housing systems from a comparative perspective. The situation in Spain in the international context is analysed, and the dynamics and change in the Spanish housing system are dealt with empirically. The empirical analysis highlights that it is important to take into account temporal dimensions, particularly age. It is confirmed that a new stage of extremely low demand for main residences is currently emerging, which may be aggravated by the current economic crisis and its effects on family formation. In addition, rental is identified as an option for enabling young people to have access to housing, and thus home ownership is questione...

2004

High homeownership rates in Spain are not the result of tradition; they are the product of the rapid social and economic changes that took place during the second half of the twentieth century. Like young people putting off leaving their parents' home, choosing to study for yet another degree, opting to set up a permanent household, or deciding to limit the size of their family, homeownership in Spain is just one of the strategies individuals and families adopt to achieve or maintain the social and economic status of average Europeans.

Regional and Sectoral Economic Studies

We analyze the evolution of second homes in the Spanish regions over the period 2001-2007, using this variable as one of the most important indicators of extra-hotel tourism activity, and compare with trends in the previous decade. The main conclusion here is that, despite the housing boom, the annual percentage increase in the number of secondary dwellings in that period was very alike to the previous period. We estimate several econometric models that take into account the impact of second homes on tourism, regional production and the rate of employment in service sectors. We also present an analysis of second home data at the provincial level.

Journal of Housing and the Built Environment, 2008

This paper explores the relationship between primary and secondary homes in the overall Spanish housing market against the background of conflicting views on the nature of this relationship. Some of the theoretical arguments in favour of the independence of the two sectors are critiqued and a series of research questions on the precise nature of any relationship are posed. In answering these questions, a range of empirical data for different spatial scales is examined. It is concluded that, for indigenous Spaniards, the two sectors of the housing market are inter-related in various ways and that the most significant contemporary dichotomy in the Spanish housing market may be between Spaniards and foreigners rather than between primary and second homes.

Universidade Pontifícia Comillas, Madrid, 2001

Una versió d'aquest treball es presentarà a la revista Population, Space and Place.

Population, Space and Place, 2013

Recent foreign immigration has become the most important sociodemographic process in Spain. It impinges on many different social aspects, among them, the interrelationship between housing and population. More than 5 million immigrants have arrived during the last 10 years, responsible for about half of new households created since 2001. The size of Spanish demographic change due to immigration, as well as the predominance of a housing model based on home ownership, justifies the interest of the study. Attention will be focused on access to home ownership by long-standing immigrants, who arrived between 1981 and 1991, observed in the 1991 and 2001 censuses, and compared with Spaniards. Their residential patterns can help us to predict the impact of the current immigration on the Spanish housing system. The conclusions point towards the beginning of a new heterogeneity in the Spanish housing system caused by a deficit of assimilation of the households with immigratory antecedents.

International Business & Economics Research Journal, 2015

Young people today are leaving the parental home; i.e., living independently at increasingly later ages. In Mediterranean Europe in particular, most males, and a large portion of females, continue to live in their parents' home until they are into their thirties. In the case of Spain, in recent years, a series of economic and social changes have led to a rise in young people's uptake of non-compulsory stages of education, resulting in increasingly late arrival on the job market (with this extended education and also high youth unemployment), characterized by higher temporary employment rates and greater vulnerability in the process of joining the labor force than previous cohorts. As regards to living independently, despite a very large increase in housing stock over the past ten years, young Spaniards encounter increasing difficulties in gaining access to housing because of higher purchase prices and the structure of the rental market. This paper will study the socioeconomic factors that have influenced the young Spanish population when deciding to leave the family home (i.e., becoming autonomous).